■r % ' > * » « o ' ^^ . -V Shabbona was born in Canada, about 1775. He \v:i-; of the Ottawa, the leading tribe of the great Algon •SHABBOVA FROM AN OLP WOOD CUT. MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 41 quin family, which embraces the Winnebagoes, Chip- pewas, and Pottawatomies. Shabbona fought with Tecumseh at the Thames, in 1813, but after this he forsook the British and remained ever after friendly to the United States. When the Winnebago war broke out he visited every village of the Pottawatomies, and by his influence prevented them from taking part in the struggle. He went to Big Foot's village at Geneva Lake to pacify the warriors, as it was believed that the chief's followers were about to descend upon the whites. Here he was taken prisoner, and came near being killed, but finally made his escape. Ever after- ward the Indians hated him. Just before the Black Hawk war Shabbona met his people in council, and succeeded in keeping them from joining the Sacs and Foxes. Black Hawk later declared that had it not been for this, the entire Pottawatomie nation would have united with him, and he could have maintained the war for years. Thereafter, it was Shabbona who protected the settlers from marauding Indians. Be- cause of his aid to the whites Shabbona's race set a price upon his head. Repeated efforts were made to kill him, and his life was that of a hunted animal. The Indians killed Pypeogee, his soij, and Pyps, his nephew. For his services, the Government gave Shabbona a tract of land, but, he having left it for a time to go on a visit west to his people, speculators seized his prop- erty and sold it. When the old chief came back, and found what had been done, his heart was broken. He wandered along the Illinois, and at each cabin door uttered the plaintive appeal, " Shabbona has nothing now." There was too great love for the aged hero, however, in the breasts of the settlers who had felt 42 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. the terrors of the Indian wars, to see him in want, and it was not long until Shabbona was given a piece of land in Grundy county. Neat buildings were erected upon this, and here he lived until his death, in 1859. It is the verdict of the old residents of the valley that that there was one "good Indian," and his name was Shabbona. An anecdote of Shabbona shows that the Indian may not be as devoid of humor as is supposed. It seems that a number of Shabbona's relatives from Canada were visiting him, making quite a retinue as he jour- neyed about. The chief and his party were in Ot- tawa, and desired to cross the Illinois-river-bridge. The structure was then a toll bridge, but instructions had been given by George Walker, the sheriff, that Shabbona and his train should be permitted to travel over as much as they pleased and without pay. A new gate-keeper was in charge on the day in question, who Icnew not of this arrangement, and, on Shabbona's :;oming up, refused to let him by unless a fee was forthcoming. The chief was deeply offended, but word was finally got to Walker, and Shabbona, with his courtiers and outriders, started ahead. The band marched " Indian file," with stately step, about eight hundred feet, to the south end of the bridge, when a loud "Waugh!" was heard. Back the solemn array came, until near the gate-keeper's office. With stolid austerity, Shabbona looked at the official, gave another gutteral "Waugh! "and once more he and his cav- alcade swung around to recross. To show its absolute independence, this stoical procession paraded back and forth until sun down! PIASA: THE INDIAN'S DEVIL PERRY ARMSTRONG, of Morris, is one of the oldest of Illinois's old settlers, Grundy county having been his home since 1843. In early days, he joined with the other pioneers in helping to defend this region against Indian depredation, and served for some time in the Black Hawk war and other border out-breaks of that period. His earlier experiences naturally made him more or less familiar with the life and customs of the Indians, and, a few years ago, he published an exhaustive history of the Sauk war. Since the days when the war-whoop was an actuality, Mr. Armstrong has occupied much of his spare time in study of Indian traditions and forms of religious wor- ship. If he be correct in the many striking conclu- sions he has drawn from his investigations, the red man established himself at a much earlier stage of the world than has been imagined. Mr. Armstrong believes the Indian was on earth at a time when some of the monstrous saurians, placed by scientists at the Tertiary Period, were in existence! Concerning this subject, the old man said to me: "Pictures seem, with all peoples, in their elementary state, to have been the earliest form of manual expres- sion. It will be found, in almost every instance, that the picture, or drawing, ante-dates the attempt at letter language. The common impulse of early man appears 44 MR EAGLE'S U S. A. to have been to represent his thoughts by the carving of a figure, rather than the grouping of characters or letters. Particularly was this true of the Indian, and if the tracings upon the rocks spread over this conti- nent could be accurately interpreted, a vast amount of history would be obtained. In no portion of the United States, however, are there more mysterious me- morials than the petroglyphs of the Mississippi valley, and of these the interest centering about the pictures of a monster known among the Indians as the ' Piasa ' is the most satisfying in the way of the curious and superstitious. "The first mention by a white man of seeing the representations of this frightful creature, the 'Piasa,' is made by Father Marquette. He says, in the account of his voyaging: " ' Passing the mouth of the Illinois, we soon came into the shadow of a tall promontory, and with great astonishment beheld the pictures of two monsters painted upon its lofty limestone front. Each of these awful figures had the face of a man, the horns of a deer, the head of a tiger, and a tail of a fish so long that it passed around the body, over the head, and between the legs. It was an object of Indian worship, and greatly impressed me with the necessity of substituting for this monstrous idolatry, the true God.' " Now it is probable that ,the petroglyphs seen by Marquette were the two that were seen by people who first settled in the region along the Illinois, even as late as the '30's. There were, at that date, two huge figures painted and incised upon a layer of bluish-gray sand-stone overlying a bed of limestone on the north bank of the Mississippi at Alton. These pictures were upon the side of the bluff, about eight feet above the MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 45 surface of the water. The drawings were about equal in size, and measured each some thirty feet in length by twelve in width. In the painting of these monsters but three colors were used: red, emblematical of war and vengeance; black, of death and despair; and green, •expressive of hope and triumph in the land of dreams, or ' the happy hunting grounds. ' The exact location of these pictures was at about the spot where the State prison at Alton now stands, and some of the rock occu- pied with this strange tracery was quarried by the con- victs in 1856. "These monsters were known to the Indians as the 'Piasa,' or 'the Bird that Devours Man,' and were the Indian representation of the Devil. For some reason, Marquette fails to mention the fact of these figures having enormous wings and great claws after the fash- ion of an eagle, but such was undoubtedly the case, as I have talked with early settlers who had seen them. The Mississippi was the great highway of travel for the Indians, and that forced them, against their will, to pass these paintings. While going near them, the In- dians used to offer up incense and sacrifices. Suppli- cations for forgiveness and mercy were also made whenever a party of savages went by these great pic- tures. " Now, did such a beast as that drawn on this cliff ever exist? " The Indian traditions were all to the point that certain of the tribes had once seen this monster, and that he had carried away countless of the number to be devoured. The Illini had a tradition to the effect thar, after the dread Piasa had committed awful depredations among the tribe, a chief, Ouatogo by name, went out to offer himself as prey for the beast, on the chance ^6 MR EAGLE'S U: S, A. that his warriors, lying in wait, might, with poisoned arrows, kill the monster as it made its descent upon the chief. The story was that the plan was successful, the beast being destroyed before it had reached Oua- togo. A Miami tradition tells of a great battle being fought so mewhere near the present town of Alton, during which the Piasa came out of its cave in the rock along the Mississippi, and carried off two of the con- tending chiefs. The famous chief, Black Hawk, told of his people having seen the Piasa, ' with wings like a swan, only ten times larger.' There are traditions among all the Indians who had their home in the Mis- sissippi valley, that claim that this Piasa once inhabited a cave near where the Illinois river joins the Missis- sippi. To look up this question of the cave. Professor John Russell, of Jersey county, this State, and best known, popularly, as the author of the poem, 'The Worm of the Still,' set out, in March, 1848, for a trip to Alton. Professor Russell's investigations, to use his own words, were as follows: "'I visited the bluffs below the Illinois, and near the point where the Piasa was pictured. My curiosity was directed toward examining a cave connected with the tradition of the Piasa, as being one of the places where the monster deposited his victims. Preceded by an intelligent guide who had a spade, I set out upon my excursion. The cave was extremely difficult of ac- cess, and at one point in our progress, I stood at an elevation of one hundred and fifty feet on the face of the perpendicular bluff, with barely room to sustain one foot. The unbroken wall towered above me, while below was the river. After a long and perilous clam- bering, we reached the cave, which was about fifty feet above the surface of the river. By the aid of a long MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 47 pole placed on a projecting rock and the upper end touching the mouth of the cave, we succeeded in reach- ing it. The roof of the cavern was vaulted, the top of which was hardly less than twenty feet high. The shape of the cave was irregular, but, so far as I could •judge, the bottom would average twenty by thirty feet. The floor of the cave was one mass of human bones. Skulls and other bones were mingled in the utmost con- fusion. To what depth they extended, I am unable to decide, but we dug to the depth of three or four feet in every quarter of the cavern, and still we found only bones. The remains of thousands must have been de- posited there. How, and by whom, it is impossible to know.' " A peculiar fact is to be noticed in connection with this tradition about the Piasa, and it is that the pictures and descriptions all show correspondence, in almost every particular, with a creature of the Mesozoic age, called the ' Ramphorhyncus. ' The Piasa and the Ramphorhyncus are identical, so far as description could possibly indicate. Certainly, this similarity is too technical and remarkable to be a mere coincidence. In view of this, there is only one conclusion I can make, and that is, that the Indian surelj'' must have been on earth at the time the remaining Ramphorhyn- cus existed ! " AN OPEN AIR BREAKFAST. /^ O EAT out doors ! " — I believe the following of I y that advice would cure more dyspepsia and kin- dred ills than all the physicians' prescriptions. We, all of us, are incapable of getting completely away from earth, no matter how desperately we attempt the hot-house existence. Who is the mortal that likes not the sight of dew-silvered grass? Who can say, truth- fully, he cares not to look over a great field of corn, on a summer morning, and see the blades rippling in the mild breeze like the ocean on a calm day? Who is he, who feels not a new courage, a new vigor, a truer deter- mination to make the best of his station, as he gets back to scenes such as these? I mused like this, one morning, as we halted by a hedge for the purpose of preparing breakfast. We had set out from Joliet early that we might enjoy the cool portion of the day as fully as possible. It was about six-thirty. The dew sparkled on the luxuriant grass that lined the roadway, as innumerable tiny diamonds. I got out of the carriage and loosened Kit's check- rein, that she might have a lunch as well as ourselves. As she dove to the feast beneath her, and began to rip up the grass, with my hand resting on the shaft, I paused to enjoy the prospect. We were on high ground. Below, at some distance, lay Joliet with its scores of great chimneys, factories, MR. EAGLE'S U, S, A. 49 columns of heavy soft-coal smoke, numberless switch engines, scurrying around the yards, like so many tireless demons, puffing, and clanging, and whistling. The steady boom-boom, boom-boom of the rolling mills, for which this town is so noted, beat upon the air with a weird rhythm, at one moment, rather musical, and the next, sounding like the ponderous bellowing of some Titan. Nearer, and all about, were the roll- ing fields of corn, whose broad green blades gently rising and falling were beating in regular rustling harmony to this half concealed anthem nature was providing for us. To me, that field of corn was beaittiful, inspiring, satisfying. I am aware that it is conventionally assumed that for a scene of grandeur and soul-contentment, one must be perched upon a lofty mountain, where he can survey, far below, the huts of a half-starved peasantry; where he can see the eternal sublimity contrasted with want and loneliness. Not for me. I loved to look over that great area of growing corn, and know that it meant prosperity, happiness, and that its heavy, golden ears were soon to send the boys and girls to the High Schools, Acad- emies and Colleges. I revelled in the thought of these things as I siw those wide blades create the undulation, that mild morning, like the dreamy vista of a placid sea. Then there were the pastures, upon whose hil- locky, deep-velvet surface the rich-blooded Holsteins were peacefully feeding. How delicious the air was! I threw back my shoulders and drew in deep breaths. A brown thrush, startled at our presence, darted out of the hedge across the road, perched nervously for a moment on one of the thorny boughs, and eyed us with suspicion. Then, uncertain, retreated to the thicket. Soon, I heard a quail, with his plaintively 50 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. cheery whistle. Then, the slow solemn warning of a crow from among the woods along the DesPlaines river which, not far below, glinted in the sun. A fellow in a neighboring field, as he lazily drove out his horses, to begin the day's work, felt the care-free, joyous inspiration that I did, for he was whistling the rollick- ing, flamboyant notes of "Old Dan Tucker." I began to poke around among our traps in the boxes fastened underneath the phaeton, much after the fashion of the "prairie schooner," and soon found my little alcohol stove. This contrivance was originally a brazier's lamp, of brass, and burned by means of a central wick, making a most intense heat, and was far superior to the much advertised " pocket stoves," and the like. I had fastened the thing on a small piece of board and arranged a couple of bent wire standards so that they would support a tin cup just above the flame. A table-spoonful of ground coffee and a little water, the cup covered, and a match applied to the wick, I set the apparatus down in the grass and in the shelter of a fence board, that the breeze might not extinguish the flame. In about four minutes, the "brew" was ready. I stirred in a little sugar and raised the steam- ing essence to my lips. Never did a cup of coffee taste so good! There, in the open air, with the invig- orating breezes fanning the landscape, this coft'ee, without cream, possessed an aroma, an intoxicating something that ho chef in a stuffy grill room could approach. I next brought out a bit of rusty tin which I had moulded into a sort of platter about four inches square, and set it over the little lamp. Presently, 1 had a piece of steak done "to the Queeij's taste." Mother, woman like, couldn't tear herself wholly loose from the ways o^ civilization, and had whipped 51 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. out from somewhere a white napkin and spread it in her lap. Upon this, with all the method of an old maid, she'd carefully laid the pie and sandwiches. She had brought along a glass tumbler and a bottle of milk. Her coffee was fixed up in the glass and hon- ored with milk, and a pinch of sugar, just as orderly sir, as if she had been preparing breakfast quietly in her kitchen. I seized a fistful of supplies and, with my tin of coffee, crawled to a soft bunch of grass by the fence and proceeded to indulge in a feast I shall not soon forget, while mother ate in dignified state in the phaeton, and alternately varied from exclaiming, "How good that coffee is!" to pestering me, every other minute, to know if I "didn't want a little milk in that cup? " IN NORTHERN INDIANA. A TOWN of eight thousand inhabitants and a three- hundred thousand dollar Court House! We had stopped over night at the home of an aged minister. A more affectionate couple than he and his devoted wife you never saw. The husband had been preacher for forty years, and was one of those who had got into the pulpit only because he had felt an over- powering call. He had been a blacksmith. His sim- ple earnestness had made his life a success in spite of the fact that he had no college education, and now, the evening of his existence, he, with his adoring spouse, was passing peacefully in this little home, surrounded by flower beds, green fields, and kind neighbors. Their wants were few. A garden supplied them with fruits and vegetables. A venerable horse and phaeton sufficed to convey them about on their little journeys to near-by friends. Frequent "donations" by former parishioners kept them with all the ready money needed. " So," as the old man said, with a twinkle in his happy gray eyes, "the Lord has treated us first- rate, leastways full as well as we deserve, I reckon." Rag carpets covered the floors of their modest dwel- ling. The library consisted mainly of Baptist records and hymn books. For papers, there were the Toledo Blade and a county weekly. And yet, it was manifest that here was a man who had m.ade his life effec- tive; who had been a real, helpful force in the world. 4- ♦ -%f ^ \ .■>- LA PORTE COUNTY COURT HOUSE. MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 53 He had done practical good in the days when he had had strength. In the waning, his mind was keen, and he was well informed as to affairs in general. He had plenty to eat, and his soul was at peace. What more could he wish? The morning was cool, the road gravelled, and as superb a drive-way as mortal could wish. We had left the old minister at his home near Door Village, and by ten o'clock were on the main street in La Porte. This was an avenue broad as a Chicago boulevard. Big business blocks lined either side, and the people on the walks were bustling and stylish. Handsome carriages were drawn up at the curb. Here was a miniature city of elegance. We approached a magnificent structure of stone. A tall tower of modern architecture arose from its center. Its windows were of plate glass. " By George, mother!" I exclaimed. "I want to know about that building," and we drove into a side street, where I got out to look around. The building was the La Porte County Court House, erected about three years ago at a cost of $300,000, and probably the finest institution of its kind in the United States, taking into consideration the population of the town. A citizen was only too glad to show me through this structure, which is the pride of the richest county in upper Indiana, and it was a treat, interest- ing indeed. The exterior constructive material is Portage red sandstone; the walls, tower, and trimmings being ar- ranged on the richly massive plan. There is nothing of the "curli-que. " The heavy, castellated style is the idea. The structure is 144 feet wide and 114 deep. From ground to roof is 70 feet, and the tower is 170 feet in height. 54 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. The principal portions of the interior are finished in qua'rter-sawn oak. On the first floor are some novel apartments called " Farmers' Rooms." These are set apart exclusively for the use of the agriculturist, and are invitingly fitted up with chairs, desks, and lounges, so that when the sunburned tiller of the soil comes to town with his family, he has as pleasant a club room as could be planned. One of the larger rooms is used for "grange" meetings and the like. This arrangement is a decided innovation, and one that should be copied all over the country. The stairways arc magnificent, with heavy carved balustrades; the ceilings expensively and artistically frescoed, and the general ornamentation suggests great outlay. On the second floor are the offices of the va- rious county departments. The court rooms are on the third floor, and are something palatial. In the Criminal, one of the stained glass windows cost $2,000. It is a great picture of Justice, with the fateful scales. As I stood within this apartment and surveyed the thick, red Wilton carpet, the massive, oaken Judge's desk, the intricately wrought chandeliers, and the lofty ceiling, I could appreciate the force of the story my guide told me of a malefactor's complaint to his law- yer, a man locally considered to be not over burdened with legal knowledge. The prisoner had just listened to the verdict of the jury pronouncing him guilty on the charge of chicken stealing. The chap was one of those listless, unim- pressionable sort of fLillows, and simply stared vacantly over the room. His cy.^. finally alighted on the stained glass window, and he whispered to his lawyer, "Say, \vhut's thet there figger over'n the winder 1 " "Why, that's Justice. Justice with the scales." MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 55 "Justice! Justice!" mused the culprit feelingly. *' Wall, I'll be darned 'f I seen much on't in this yere trial o' mine! " "Well, well now," answered his cold blooded shy- ster. "Don't worry. The jury has gone against us, but you have one consolation. You have been tried in the finest courtroom in the State of Indiana! " La Porte has another claim to distinction, aside from its Court House, namely, the exceptional street pav- ing. Indeed, in this respect it is said to be one of the best appointed towns in the country. All the principal streets are laid with brick, and so evenly has the work been done that the avenues are very like sanded floors. Good roads and fine farms were the rule all through this section of Indiana. The citizens of Valparaiso, 1-a Porte, South Bend, and Elkhart, love to boast of their road, system, and it is with perfect right that they can do so. Carefully graded, macadamized, and well kept, the tourist blesses the highway commissioners as he passes over these thoroughfares. Northern Indiana is a garden spot. The whole region is set with scores of tiny lakes that make alluring resorts for Chi- cagoans during the hot weather. Eagle Lake, near La Porte, is one of the most popular, and is a great place for the meeting of Summer Educational associa- tions, camping parties, and similar affairs. Farming is carried on in this section by men of intelligence who discovered, some time ago, that it is not the number of acres that makes the farm, but the development In this respect, they are much ahead of Illinois, where so many renters are struggling along in trie effort to carry i6o, or 200, acres, and thus cannot help letting their fields get full of cockle burrs, and their pastures run to thistles. We found broad areas of corn in which ^6 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. scarcely a weed was to be seen ; farm houses that looked pleasing in their white paint, and manifest thrift, and seeming comfort everywhere. Frequently, the log house met our view. The identical building in which the pioneer, who might be the owner of hundreds of acres, once had his home. These structures were now used mostly for tool houses. .As one looked at these decaying log affairs, standing as so many solemn mon- uments of the past, he could not help thinking of what factors they had been in the making of the West ! How genuine must have been the feeling that animated an old farmer near Valparaiso, at whose house we stopped to get a drink of water. The old fellow was sitting on his porch basking in the afternoon sun. I asked him about the hut that stood a little back from the road. " Yes," he said, " thet wuz ther palace fer wife an' me when we come hyar, 'n I reckon I shan't let it be tore ter pieces as long's we lives," and he looked off toward the object in a way that showed it was one of his treasures. Northern Indiana is where most of the supply of that herb of childhood's days — peppermint — is sent out. This industry was, once, almost exclusively confined to Massachusetts, but, now, this locality has control. In St. Joseph, La Porte, Elkhart, and LaGrange coun- ties, there are hundreds of acres of peppermint marsh. The same is true of several of the counties just over the Michigan line. Peppermint requires a warm, rich soil. In its cultivation, the method is as follows: l"he ground is laid off in furrows, perhaps twenty inches apart, and in these the plants are set out. Much attention has to be expended in keeping the plants free from weeds. The harvest commences in August, and lasts until October. The first crop is MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 57 the best ; at the end of the fourth year the crop has to be plowed up. A new crop springs up from the old roots, but a field rarely endures over six years. In harvest- ing, an old-fashioned "cradle" is used, much resem- bling the wheat "cradle" of New England. After cutting, the mint, is raked into heaps, and left to wilt for about fifteen hours before it goes to the vat to be distilled. The mint is packed into the vat by treading until the receptacle is full. The vat is then tightly closed, and steam turned on, entering at the bottom. A pipe at the top of the tank connects with a " worm," into which the volatfUzed oil enters and is condensed. While in Elkhart, I strolled into the office of a local paper. The editor was soberly "sticking type," and, after a few minutes' conversation, extended the free- dom of the office, and went back to his case. I sat down at his desk, and while the type busily clicked, and the flies as busily hummed, began to poke around among the bushel or so of "exchanges" that lay tum- bling about in dusty heaps on the floor. In glancing over a sheet published in the Southern part of the State, I came across the following description of a neighborhood incident. It shows that your Hoosier editor may have some ability at "realism" as well as his metropolitan brother: "An awful accident befell Miss Gertrude VanBloke of Litchfield last Sunday morning. She was curling her hair for church when she accidentally dropped the curling iron down her neck. We don't mean down her neck exactly, it was more down her back, and yet that isn't correct. She dropped it down between her clothing and the frog of her neck, and it went sizzling and frying down, down, down, until it was beyond her reach. The scene wliich t'ullowed was awful! Ger- 58 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. trude jumped up and down like a Comanche Indian at a snake dance and hollered, ' Fire! Fire! Ouch! Hell- inaminute! Police! Murder.' Jementiy! Wow!' using many expressions that seemed to indicate that she was in pain. In the meantime, the house was filled with the odor of baked back bone and fried tenderloin. "Her parents came rushing into her room and found Gertrude executing the coonjine and thought she was crazy. The old man dashed a pitcher of water over her and her mother threw a quilt over her to put her out. But the curling iron was still getting in its work and rapidly burning its way into her left kidney. Gertrude tried to tell them what the matter was but she could only gasp, 'Take it out! You dod-blasted old idiots, take it out! Take it out!' But her fright- ened parents didn't know what to do, and got a rope and tied her. The curling iron then turned over and commenced to cook her floating ribs and baked the skin from the vertebrae. She kicked and squalled like a camp meeting of cats, and the neighbors came running in. " Finally she managed to tell them what the matter was, and her mother cut open her corset with a case knife, and the curling iron fell out, covered with cuti- cle and smelling like hog killing time. Since then, Gertie wears her lumbar region done up in linseed oil poult'ces and sleeps on her frontispiece. The doctor says her back looks like a crazy quilt, or the map of Cuba after a revolution. He says she had a narrow escape. The burns extended entirely over the withers and the sebaceous follicles. ' The jib boom of the pylorous, he says is badly scarified, while the base of her dorsal fin is fricasseed so seriously that amputation may be necessary." YE BIBLIOPOLO EXPERTO. TOWARDS evening, on August 4th, we arrived in Bronson, Michigan, a little town of eight hun- dred. I happened to glance across the street and saw a building that at once enlisted my attention. I^ was of white, enameled brick, with the joints painted blue, while all colors, and combinations of red, green, gold and yellow, were used in decorating cornice and window casing. But the striking thing was the signs that covered the structure from top to curb. I began to decipher them. Watching the red pennant that flaunted from the cupola, I finally made out that it bore these letters: " B-i-b-1-i-o-p-o-l-o E-x-p-e-r-t-o. " Below, in small characters, at the base of the cupola, was the legend, "J. Francis Ruggles. " Over the upper windows were the words, "Lux. Lux." Beneath was a string of letters reaching from the east side of the bay window across the top of the door, half way over the west window. By concentrating my attention upon them, and carefully repeating aloud each syllable, I read again: "YE BIBLIOPOLO EXPERTO." The windows bore the name "J. Francis Ruggles," as did also the curtains. A large stone set in the wall at the southeast corner had chiselled in its face, "Curioso. J. Francis Ruggles. Bookery." That last word had some practical suggestion. Inspecting the structure still more closely, I noticed that about the cornices 6o MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. and trimmings were odd designs of swords, torches, and griffins. If ever an institution bespoke individuality this did. While I was out at the hotel stable putting away my horse, I asked the attendant who " J. Francis Ruggles" was. " Darndest cuss you ever seel " he replied, and stopped short. As this information did not seem much more definite than some of the signs I had been study- ing, I pressed for a little further enlightenment. "Just git at the critter, 'n talk to him. That's the bes' way to git the facks o' his case." " But where does he stay?" "Well, he gits his meals at the hotel yere, 'n roosts in thet there coop o' his'n 'cross the street. He's got a cheer out'n the hotel bar-room he sets in that no body else aint 'lowed to tech. He's good natured 'nough, 'n ef ye was ter shy 'round there now, I reckon ye'd find him." I walked around presently to the hotel entrance. Within, sure enough, with its back against the clerk's desk, was the chair. Its top was embellished in gold letters, "J. Francis Ruggles." A small, pale, little man, dressed in black, came quietly along and sat down in the chair. I backed off and pretended to be study- ing a railroad map, but was really, of course, looking over Mr. Ruggles. The worthy gentleman was pick- ing his teeth and, apparently, at peace with the world. He wore a brown straw hat having a brim, perhaps, half an inch wide. He was smooth shaven, with the exception of a tiny bunch of carefully-nurtured chin whiskers. His clothing wijs absolutely spotless, and seemed as if it were worn with constant brushing. His black string tie was not made up after the coventional fashion. The ends, instead of being secured in a bow. were brought across each other, and, holes having been THE ODUI lOKH'.M MR. EAGLK'S U. S A. 6l punched at the point of crossing, the cravat was fas- tened on to the collar button The indications were that here at last was the individual who had solved the problem of generations — keeping the necktie in place. His boots had split leather tops, and were polished in the economical, spit-but-once-in-the-box style. This man's general demeanor suggested a meek and humble "follower of the cloth." After a while, I walked over to Mr. Ruggles and introduced myself. His greeting was cordial, and we were soon engaged in pleasant conversation. "Some of those signs on your building are rather unusual," I ventured. "Yes," he said, "I know when I had them put up, I agreed to pay the painter so much for the lump job, and he come near striking on me when his work was about half done, as he said he didn't contract to paint words that would reach clear down into Indiana." He then went back to tell me of what a time he had had putting up the structure. "When I began, I thought it would be good policy to take note of whatever sug- gestions folks wanted to make, as I might get some valuable hints, but the advisory business spread like the measles, and when it got so I was receiving forty or fifty pointers a morning, I felt that things were get- ting too promiscuous. I pronounced a ukase to the effect that / was erecting this building and not the town^ as some folks seemed to think." On this subject of the "building," Mr. Ruggles was an enthusiast, and it was manifest that the institution was the pride of his life. On the matter of books, to which we finally drifted, I found him possessed of really remarkable in- formation, and regarding rare editions, and curious volumes, his knowledge was profound. We talked on 62 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. until late in the evening, and our conversation ended by my being invited to come over, next morning, and inspect the " Odditorium." Mr. Ruggles was on hand promptly after breakfast. His night's repose had brightened his grey eyes, and he was hopping around as chipper as a bantam rooster. While we were crossing the street, he informed me that the " Odditorium " had "a two-foot foundation wall and above it, a three-brick wall laid to the top with a three-inch air space, to insure a dry climate within the building," and that a "Coat of arms" was placed above the door, said coat consisting of ' pens rampant and ink-stands militant." In a moment, the key had been turned in thedoor,and we entered the sacred por- tals. It was not the rows of books that astonished one, but the decorations. The wall paper looked, at first glance, like a great crazy quilt. And yet, it was not unpleasing. Noticing my surprise, my host informed me that there were 165 kinds of paper to be seen on the walls! I have no reason to doubt him, for every hue of the rainbow was represented, and it seems that months were consumed in obtaining the collection. The wood work was equally as interesting. Half a dozen varieties were shown in the business room in which we stood. "I have," said Mr. Ruggles, "used birch, chestnut, beech, hickory, Georgia pine, sandal- wood, teak, cocobola, lignum vitae, ebony, walnut, ash, maple, bird's eye maple, elm, oak, mahogany, rose- wood, satin-wood, and," — he paused for breaih, but concluded, as an alleged pun, "wood have more if I could think of 'em!" He added that he had sent to Asia, Africa, and the four corners of the globe for these specimens, and they were employed in many strikingly beautiful designs. There is probably no building in the MR. EAGLE'S U S. A. 63 country that has so many sorts of papers and woods in its interior as has this at Bronson, Michigan. A few steps to the rear was a flight of stairs leading up to a glass door marked, " Sanctum Sanctorum," for every division was supplied with a sign of some kind. Up the stairs we went and into the private ofifice. I began to see that the proprietor was one of those who have a "place for everything and everything in its place." Things were as neat as if sandpapered, and the use to which each nook and closet was designed was evinced by the proper sign. Even the coal hod and broom were set in the " Omniumgatherum. " A small washstand, off at one side was the " Lavatorium." In the matter of an office desk even, your J. Francis could not be content with that of ordinary type, but had had one made after his own peculiar notion. It would shut to- gether like a big box, but when opened appeared as two desks hinged in the form of a half square. This private ofifice was finished in bird's eye maple, walnut, cherry, and ash. The order in which Mr. Ruggles' private library, ledgers, and odd trifles were arranged would have told, if nothing el'^e had, that the proprie- tor was a bachelor. No woman could have endured such miraculous method. Her very soul wo,uld have been inspired with the desire to break in here with mop and pail. Then, we ascended another flight of steps and pass- ing under the sign, " Hall of Single Blessedness," en- tered an apartment sumptuous in mahogany, curled oak, swamp ash, and sandalwood. Here were lounges, hand- some chairs, ceilings in sky blue and russet. The chairs and furniture were so placed that I knew they were never permitted to be in any other position. It was a most inviting resort. If the owner felt indolent, he 64 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. could repair here and, reclining upon his red plush sofa, look down through the large windows, like a mon- arch, upon the less-favored beings who toiled along the streets below. I was next led to the "Saint's Re^t." This, as the society editor loves to say, was "a symphony in green and gold," and contained the folding bed where the owner, after the day's round of reading and musing, sought solitary repose for his tired shanks. A patent boot-blacking arrangement was fas- tened in a corner, behind a door. More patent ware was evinced in brush holders, coat hangers, and the like. "Here's where I keep a small stock of supplies," said Mr. Ruggles, pointing to an open case of drawers. One drawer contained ginger, another, some lemons, a third, cloves, others, cream of tartar, pennyroyal, and catnip. I laughed. "There was a lady I showed through this building once," exclaimed Mr. Ruggles, slightly piqued, "who said my apartments looked like an old maid's paradise, but I didn't thank her for the remark ! " Near the oaken chest was a lemon squeezer. You see Ruggles, when thirsty, did not have to go to the drug store and plank down ten cents for a soda. No sir, all he had to do was to sky up stairs and, in a trice, he could brew himself a lemonade and drink it all by his lonesome. We mounted a third stairway, crawled through a small aperture and were in the "Omnium Surveyorum," or cupola, to ordinary mortals. The view from here off over the thrifty orchards and green fields was delightful. After enjoying this for a time, we began de- scending, and kept on descending until we were in the basement among the boxes and bales of the "Shippo- rum," or shipping department. From thence, through the rear door, I was conducted to the " Refuge de MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 65 Tornado," or cyclone cellar, an ingeniously construc- ted hole in the earth, some fifteen feet from the "Odditorium," about six feet deep, and ten feet square, and which, with its tiled walls, cemented floor, and earth covered roof, was more neatly appointed than some* parlors I have been in. The idea of this havtn of peace was not so unwise, for Michigan, since 1823, has had seventy-four tornadoes. As we went back into the "Odditorium," I said, "Mr. Ruggles, you certainly have everything here but a wife. Why don't you hustle around and ensnare some one of these pretty girls I see in Bronson?" " Not much!" he answered with venom, "I've worked like a slave to get this palace built, and if I got a wife, she'd be running the Odditorium herself and want to have me out there iw the tornado cave, feeding me through a hole in the roof. No sir, I know when I'm well off. I want no female help about this institution! " We got back into the main book room upstairs and I was shown odd and ancient tomes, autographs, coins, and newspapers, until my eyes were weary. He had volumes here that many a city bibliophilist '.vould revel in and he told me that he sometimes sold to searchers who had hunted vainly through New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago. It seems that the la- mented Eugene Field knew of this strange Michigan repository and had posted a few of his intimates re- garding it Presently, we found ourselves taking a rest in the "Sanctum Sanctorum" once more. Mr. Ruggles got to speaking of the days when he had foK lowed, from town to town, the occupation of a "book agent." In talking of the State of Kansas, he men- tioned Wichita. "I'll never forget Wichita as long 's I live !" he declared. "How's that?" I asked. "Well. 66 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. I got in there, one noon, and went to work. I had been out about an hour, when a fellow in a blue coat grabbed me by the collar and was waltzing me along the street almost before I could get my breath, and certainly before I could my senses. I finally managed to protest, and demanded to know what I was arrested for. He wouldn't say anything, but yanked me along as if we were going to a fire. He weighed about two hundred, so I continued to stay in his company. We got down to the office of a chap I learned was city clerk. There, I was given to understand I had been caught red-handed selling books in the holy precincts of this dirty, prairie-dog town without having paid my license. I told the officer I was not aware of any such ordinance being in force. The officer simply walked away and the clerk began to talk with me, and said that he guessed he could fix it all right, as this was my first offense and it had been committed in ignorance. He suggested that ten dollars, paid to him, would quiet all proceedings. Like a fool, I took his word and handed him the money. Well, it wasn't two hours, until another infernal policeman nabbed me again. That city clerk had the face to say that, as I had ap- peared so honest, he decided to let me go until morning when I was to be present for my trial, but that he was surprised that I had gone right to peddling books again. T paid ten dollars and thought that disposed of the case ! ' I exclaimed. 'You did nothing of the kind,' that scoundrel declared, cool as a cucumber, 'and if you persist in charges of that kind I shall sue you for slander.' "I was so mad that for a minute I could not open my head, but when I got my tongue, I gave it to 'em! They made a great roar and threatened everything, MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 67 almost to having me drawn and quartered. I saw I was in for it, and demanded an immediate trial. They told me it was too late that day, as police court closed at three o'clock and there could be no trial before "nine o'clock next morning. I asked the policeman where I could get a lawyer. He took me up the street and ti> an office in the rear of a tailor-shop. The lawyer told me I had a pretty difficult case, and one involving a good many fine law points, as I had, after being permitted to go on my own recognizance, gone out and committed again the frightful offence, but he thought he could get me off. He demanded twelve dollars in advance for taking the case and, of course, I had to pay that. He was a red-faced, dissipated looking fellow and I did not like his appearance, but I was a stranger in the place, and decided one lawyer'd be about as good as another. '' Next morning they called my case and my lawyer made a lot of noise, but I guess that was about all it was. Then, the lying policemen told their stories. Anybody would have known they were lying, but that old Justice, with a face as long as a sword, said the Court regretted the necessity, but had no alternative other than to fine me six dollars and costs. I paid over eight dollars more. Then I told 'era they were nothing but a set of rascals. They tried to hush me up and said I'd get into more trouble. I told 'em I didn't care, for they were bound to get all I had anyway. I knew the best thing I could do was to get out of the cussed town, but I'll die if while I walked to the depot the officer who went along didn't strike me for a dollar to buy cigars with, on the plea that he had befriended me by getting a lawyer for me ! I've crossed Wichita off my map! " THE FIRST STATE PUBLIC SCHOOL. IN the forenoon of August 6th, we reached Coldwater, Michigan, a perfect paradise of a town in Branch county. With its beautiful shade trees, wide, sandy streets, splendidly-kept lawns, and dwelling houses painted so brilliantly white, it seemed nothing was lacking to make the place attractive. An air of com- fortable wealth pervaded the whole region. The nat- ural surroundings seemed to have a reflex effect on the people, for everybody had a busy, happy appearance that told of respectability. If I were seeking to make my home in a small town, I know of none more attrac- tive than Coldwater. In the afternoon, I went up to see the Michigan State Public School, located just one mile. above Coldwater. If it be a credit for a Commonwealth to expend effort toward caring for its helpless, homeless children, many of them of illegitimate parentage, and placing them in away to become useful men and women, then the State of Michigan is worthy of the highest commendation. Michigan was the first in the Union to establish a State public school. It was of this institution that Drouin de Lhuys, in 1878, before the French Institute, said: "The State of Michigan, which has existed only about forty years, has the merit of preceding ancient Europe in the inauguration of a new era for dependent children. " H in O MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 69 This school, up to July i, 1897, had received 4081 children, and, through its agency, good homes had been secured for most of this number: a work that is a truer memorial to Michigan than could be many mon- uments of brass. The first official action leading to the establishment of this school was taken by Hon. W. P. Baldwin, in 1868, after a visit to several poor-houses, and in his first in- augural address as Governor of Michigan, he recom- mended the appointment of a commission to investigate the subject of preventive and reformatory institu- tions. Such commission was organized, and two years were spent in observation and study of this subject. In his second message, Governor Baldwin made an even more urgent appeal for legislation that should improve the condition of children then in the poor-house. On February 15, 189 1, the commission made its report, urging the establishment of the State Public School. After various discussions, a measure providing for the building of such an institution was passed by both branches of the Assembly and signed by the Governor. About $80,000 were appropriated by the State, and the site above Coldwater selected, the town contributing a fund of $25,000. By May, 1874, the buildings were constructed and ready for occupancy. Since that time, additional structures have been erected, so that the present plant represents about $150,000. The school stands within a handsome park, situated on high ground, commanding a superb view of the country about, and surrounded by the school farm of 160 acres. The main building is four stories high, in- cluding basement, and its ground dimensions are about fifty by fifty feet. To the right, is the school house. To the left, a dormitory, and surrounding these, in pic- TO MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A, turesque locations, are nine cottages. To the rear, are the hospital, engine house, laundry, and farm houses. It was provided at the outset that the institution should be non-sectarian, and that, when possible, pref- erence in admitting inmates should be given to the children of Union soldiers and sailors. The method of conducting the affairs of the concern is most care- ful, strict, and expeditious. P'ull provision has been made in various statutes, passed from time to time, and " child saving is carried on in Michigan with remarkable effectiveness. In every county of the State, there is an agent of the school. These officials are under the supervision of the State Superintendent, and work in conjunction with the Superintendents of the Poor in the several counties. When a child is found whom it is believed best to have placed in the school, applica tion is made to the Probate Judge of the county in which the dependent lives, and a day is set apart for a formal hearing just as in any law trial. By this means, all the facts are brought out, and the merits of the case arrived at. If it is decided to place the child in the institution, its parents, if known, are required to yield up all claim over it, and the little one becomes the ward of the State. The afternoon I visited the institution, there were nearly 300 little tots, of ages ranging from five to nine, playing in various parts of the grounds. Many were out at the swings, others roaming through the gardens and chattering at the farm hands as they busily plied their hoes. These small beings were a study. A few had the misshapen heads, the low brows and the heavy, staring eyes that told of criminal parentage. Some had the nervous movements that bespoke mischief and fun. But for the most part, they were as bright a lot MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 71 of children as could be found anywhere. So far as one could discover, every reasonable care was exercised for their proper training. The nine cottages contain the indoor playgrounds, and they are provided with all the ingenious toys and devices that delight the youngster. Each cottage is in charge of a matron During the school year, six teachers are employed. All these women who have control of the children are required to be either Normal, or Kindergarten, graduates. As the law now provides, children as young as six months may be sent to the school, and during the past year,, one of the cottages has been set apart for the care of babies. While the children are in the school, the county agents are investigating with the purpose of finding homes for as many as possible, since it is the policy of the State not to do anything to assist in developing these wards to a life of dependency. Just as rapidly as it can be done, good homes are secured, and the children are taken from the institution to places where they can have the fostering care of home-life. Those who adopt children are required to give strict account of their stewardship. If a child goes, out to receive ill treatment, the fact is soon known by the representa- tives of the State, and woe betide the unfeeling guar- dian. So thoroughly and adroitly is this espionage manipulated that there is small chance of undetected imposition. Hundreds of self-supporting, enterprising young people can be found all through Michigan today who owe their start in the right direction to the State Public School, and many noted citizens, among them General Russell A. Alger, have, for years, followed the custom of making liberal donations to this institution. The Superintendent of the school is A. J. Murray, 72 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. an alumnus of the Michigan State Normal School, and an educator of many years' experience. He said, in a rather enthusiastic vein, to me: " I have been a teacher for a long time, but I think I was never more deeply interested in any one branch <'>f training than this. It is a form of child develop- ment that is a success because it is conducted on a thoughtful, systematic basis. I will undertake to say that the thirty-one thousand dollars it annually requires to keep this school going could not be more wisely or beneficently spent. Since this school was opened, Michigan has become noted for her freedom from pau- perism. " "PARADISIAN SOUTHERN MICHIGAN." T TELL you I shan't stand it a minute longer! " I " Sorry, lady, but we be 'n givin' ye the best accommodations we kin." '•Accommodations! Call this 'accommodations?* Here it is, hotter than fury, and the musquitos thicker than sin, and no musquito netting on the windows." "Well, we get 'long ,thout 'em. So does the other folks. We haint never be'n 'customed to have 'em." '•Get along without them? How many travelers stop here? One a year?" " Taint no use to get riled, lady. Til do anything I kin to make ye com'fble." '• I should think it looked like it! Weather such as this and not a single bit of netting in the hotel! Why it's outrageous to make travelers suffer like this! In- stead of asking us to pay two dollars apiece to stay here, you ought to hand each of us five ! The noise died down with a lot of mumbling I could not hear distinctly. The above dialogue took place in the hotel at Quincy, Michigan, about one o'clock on the night of August 6th. We had scarcely turned northward out of Indiana before we realized that, so far as the roads were con- cerned, we had made a grievous mistake. Instead of being covered with a layer of carefully-spread gravel, we found ourselves plodding over miles of fine white 74 MR. EAGLE'S V. S. A. sand. Into this, the narrow-rimmed wheels of our pha- eton sank so deeply that all Kit could do was to tug ahead in the awful heat as if she were pulling a load of lead. We began to find stretches of low woods and swamp that seemed to shut out the breezes and make the air oven-like. These areas harbored myriads of musquitos. They would settle in clouds upon Kit's neck and flanks, and I used to periodically get out and scrape them off with a palm-leaf fan. The towns we passed through were models of attractiveness, but these country roads and surrounding were otherwise. Everyone remembers that terrific two weeks of August, 1897, when the thermometer registered daily from 95 to 110° We were elected to spend this two weeks trudging over these sand roads of " Paradisian South- ern Michigan," as the railway tim'^-tal^les call it, but the "paradise" seemed to me to be most patronized by the musquitos. And they were none of your feeble nervous insects, either, but vigorous old gallinippers that in the language of Mr. Fitzsimmons, "were well up in the art of jabbing and getting away. " That night at Quincy found me in a tiny box of a room, having a single, small window. Mother's apartment was just across the hall, and larger, having two windows. There was no transom over the door, which I was compelled to close, as I wanted to be sure of keeping my few per- sonal belongings. Oh, it was hot! The room seemed stifling. When we had driven from Coldwater that af- ternoon, the mercury stood at 98° I peeled off every thing but my good name, lay down on the bed, and consigned myself to torment. I had been there about two minutes, when I heard a thump at my door. "Who is it ? " I asked. " It's I. John, arn't you most dead?" MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. 75 " Just alive," I answered consolingly. " Well, what are we going to do? " " Grin, and bear it ! " " But there is not a musquito-netting on these win- dows! " " Just discovered it? " " Well, what are we going to do? " " Blamed if I know." "Well, we've got to do something," mother kept on. Presently, I said, "Oh mother, do crawl in there and keep quiet! You can't change the weather and 'skeeters." I heard the door slam, and, after a while, a mode- rately strong snore made me think mother had found "peaceful valley." I recalled no more until I seemed to hear a muttering of voices. It grew louder and aroused me so that I sat up on my elbow and listened intently. I thought one of the voices was familiar. I got up, and went to the door and listened again. "Well, by George!" I exclaimed, under my breath, "if she isn't down there jawing that poor little night- clerk!" The conversation was just as I've related it at the beginning. After a bit, a figure covered with white stalked along the hall. "Here!" it exclaimed, in a tragic whisper, "take this and put it over your face ! " and I was handed a big wet cloth. " I've been down stairs, got a towel, and cut a hole in it that I can stick my nose through, and I'm going to try now and see if I can't keep those mus- quitos from eating me. All they can touch of me is my nose anyway." " Oh mother, do for pity's sake go to bed before you get the fire brigade and the whole town of Quincy y6 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. aroused. What do you think that poor chap down stairs can do? There are just as many musquitos here now as there were before you went down and made the howl. " "Well, I was going to do something. 1 wouldn't stand it !" Once more, I sought my lowly couch, and thought the campaign had terminated for that night. 1 had snoozed about ten minutes, when mother wanted to know "how I was." She kept that up at regular inter- vals until the snores overcame her and the paroxysm of fussing. I heard no further from her until morning We shall never forget "the spending of the heated term in the woods of Michigan," where mother deliv- ered lectures to so many hotel men, that, as we after- wards referred to different places in this region where we had stopped, it seemed she remembered some of the localities chiefly according to the length and variety of " talking to " she had given the bonifaces. N THE MAUMEE VALLEY. FORTS MIAMI AND MEIGS. HE who battles for his country must do so because it is his inmost convicti(5n that such is his duty — not because he hopes to hand his name down to posterity. The true soldier goes out with a fixed willingness to lay down his life for the national honor, and, if need be, repose forever unknown. Too often that is the fate he does suffer. Within the enclosure that marks the location of old Fort Meigs, on the east bank of the Maumee river, op- posite Maumee City, and about seven miles below To- ledo, Ohio, lie the bones of thirteen officers and twenty- six privates of the United States Army. Men who fell in the attack on the Fort, in May, 1813, when this now prosperous and beautiful valley was the theatre of Indian rapine and butchery. Not a slab, headstone, or mound, designates the resting place of these patriots. Even their names and regiments are practically unknown. The troops of lit- tle children that come down from the town of Perrys- burg (just above the Fort and on the same side of the river) to ramble among the great, circuitous embank- ments that once caught the shells of British batteries and the bullets of Shawanese rifles, love to tell the stranger of the important points of interest, and, some- 78 MR. EAGLE'5 U S. A. times, after they have nigh exhausted their stock of in- formation, they will point their chubby fingers vaguely off northeastward and solemnly say: " They's some soldier's buried over there! " It is a satisfaction, however, to know that after the lapse of eighty-four years, a movement has been begun by certain prominent residents of Toledo and Wood county looking to the restoration of Forts Meigs and Miami, as well as the other historic points in this famous Maumee Valley and vicinity, and the placing of monuments and memorials that may fittingly and intelligently designate the scenes of some of the most important eyents in the early history of the country. This enterprise is being conducted by the Maumee Val- ley Monument Association, which has its headquarters at Toledo, and of which Rutherford B. Hayes was first president. The Association has been in existence some eight years, and the renewed interest it has succeeded in arousing concerning the illustrious deeds done by American soldiers in this region, is decidedly credita- ble. The Association hopes, eventually, through ap- propriations from Congress and subscriptions from patriotic citizens, to have monuments, or markers, at Fort Industry, on the site of Toledo, Fort Miami, Fort Meigs, Fort Defiance, near the present Defiance, Fort Wayne, at Fort Wayne, the battlefield of Fallen Tim- bers, and the old burial ground on Put-In-Bay Island, in Lake Erie. Forts Miami and Meigs were located almost in the center of the Indian outbreaks that, between 17S7 and 1814, made the Northwest Territory synonymous with the terms blood and terror. Fort Miami was estab- lished by the British, in 1793, for the purpose of aiding England in her efforts to gain possession of as much of MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 79 the Territory as possible. The present village of Maumee City is built just across the river from Fort Meigs, that is, on the west side. About a mile nortli of Maumee City, and close by the western bank, the traces of Fort Miami are to be seen, chiefly distin- guished by a deep depression at the top of the bluft". This was the oldest of any of the forts that were built in this region. It was first used as a trading post, but subsequently came into the hands of the British to be employed for military purposes. It was abandoned by them after the treaty of 1795. The northeastern angle of the work, and a portion of each adjoining curtain, together with the greater part of the demilune, in ad- vance of the northern front, are still in a fair state of preservation. The river front has been destroyed. The site is a part of the plat of Maumee City, occupying about five and one-half acres. Apple trees have grown all about the place, and their knotted boughs sway over the spot where, in May, 1813, scores of helpless pio- neers were butchered by the Indians, at the instigation of the English monster, Sir George Proctor. One who cons up a bit with a school history or the like, and then strolls, as I did, leisurely across the bridge leading directly over from Maumee City to Fort Meigs, will be struck by the fact that the old fort is so well preserved in spite of the wagon roads, electric road, and other labors that have been prosecuted di- rectly through the earthworks. The village of Perrys- burg (named in honor of the Hero of Lake Erie) is but a few steps up the hill from the Fort. Communication between these two towns, Maumee City and Perrys- burg, had to be arranged for, and, in so doing, it be- came a problem of how not to wholly destroy the old landmark. So carefully has it been managed, however So MR- EAGLK'S U. S. A. that nearly two-thirds of the original embankments re- main. It is not a very difificult matter to pick out al- most the exact boundaries. 'l"he original lines of cir- cumvallation inclosed an area of about one and three- tenths acres. Near the center was the powder maga- zine. An old well to be seen near one of the dusty wagon roads is the same out of which drank William Henry Harrison's troops. The soldiers' graves are in the northeastern corner of the fort, and near where the officers' houses stood. The fort forms part of the farm of Timothy and Michael Hays. These men have been careful in permitting no plow to be run over the locality of the graves, and have done nothing to disturb the original appearance of things. It is the plan of the Monument Association, before referred to, that the grounds of all these historic forts shall be purchased and turned into public parks, after the proper monuments, costing from three to five thous- and dollars, have been erected. As I climbed to the top of the great ridge that was thrown up on the night of May 2, 1813, when the seige of Meigs was begun, and which extended clear through the entire length of the fort from north to south, I could not but marvel at the attractive scenery that spread about me, and began to think of the wonderful change eighty-four years have worked in this region. I sat down on a velvety knoll and, saying to myself, " It would be a very proper thing to contemplate,'" con- cluded : " I will therefore contemplate. " It was a warm, sunny afternoon. Below me, the broad, shallow Mau- mee stretched away to the southward as a rippling, sil- very band. Across the river, where a Miami camp had once existed, the spires and cottages of the quiet, pas- toral village of Maumee arose from among the shade MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. gl trees. A cave-like opening in the opposite river bank showed where the Britisli cannon had once roared. To my left, looking off southward, some fields, now be- longing to small farms, marked the battleground of Fallen Timbers, where, on August 20, 1794, General Wayne dealt such overwhelming defeat to the savages. To my right, on the hill, the white walls of Perrysburg glared in the hot sun. Away in the distance, a dull line of smoke indicated the busy city of Toledo. As I sat thinking of what an allurement civilization had wrought here, and tried to imagine how this valley must have seemed when the Indians were roaming the neighboring hills and paddling along the river, I heard a low whir-whir that quickly rose to almost a shriek, and, looking around, I saw an electric car shooting down toward me from Perrysburg. From 1780 to 1897, in less than ten seconds! I scrambled down in a jiffy from my easy perch, hailed the car, and got aboard for a run up to Toledo. It would be hard to find a railway of this sort that gives one a finer jaunt than this Maumee Vallev line. A double track extends from Toledo, down the east side of the' river, through Perrysburg, then through Fort Meigs, and across the river to Maumee City and thence, back again to Toledo, making a cir- cuit of about eighteen miles. From Maumee upward, one passes by numerous Summer hotels, residences, gardens, and club grounds, and for picturesqueness, mortal could long for nothing more delightful. Of late years, it has become quite the fashion for wealthy To- ledo families to own homes along the Maumee, and small wonder is it. After a busy day in the bustling town, the tired office man can jump on the electrics, and, in forty minutes, be out to his country home where 82 MR. EAGLE'S U S A. original-package air greets his lungs, and nature's hills, flowers, and birds soothe his worried soul. I had a short talk with one of the editors of the vene- rable Toledo Blade^ during which he told me he had worked in various metropolitan centers, "but," said he, "I would not give up the privileges of my home down in Maumee City for the attractions of the best flat in New York." When I got back to our hotel at Maumee, in the evening, I found mother had just come in from a ram- ble through Fort Meigs. She had been entertained during the expedition by a flock of children, and here is what she said: "Well, I've been over around Fort Meigs, and I've had the greatest time with a lot of little children. The cutest lot of little folks you ever saw! " I was standing by the road, looking at the different mounds, when along came a little Shetland pony hitched to a tiny wagon, and the wagon was just piled full of children. They were giggling and laughing, and the moment they saw me they stopped the pony. Out they tumbled and began to look at me, wondering, I suppose, what I was doing over there all alone. They were bare headed and bare footed, and of ages ranging from five to ten. With their tow hair fluttering in the wind, and their eyes full of fun, they made a picture. " ' Well, children,' I said, ' where is the fort? ' " 'Oh, all around here!' they exclaimed in unison, making vague and sweeping gestures with their hands and arms. " ' Say, won't your horse run away if you leave him there unhitched? ' " 'Oh no, he's all right,' and they giggled again. " 'Well, how am I going to get over that fence?' I MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 83 asked with a smile, as I pointed in the direction of the great ridges of earth that lay on the other side of the road, but separated from that territory by a four-board obstruction. " 'Oh we'll help ye over, lady. We'll help ye. 'They grinned, sucked their thumbs, and giggled some more._ " I handed my sun shade to one and she poked it through the fence to a curly-headed little boy who had already scrambled over. Another took my satchel. I gathered my skirts about me, put my foot on the lower board and climbed up. In the meantime, a couple of little boys had reached the top board and sat perched there like bantams. They put out their hands and pulled me along. With the aid of this united colony of courtiers I managed to get on the other side of the fence. Then my cavalcade began to show me around. They chattered so fast and giggled so much that I had hard work to keep track of what they were saying. It seemed to me mostly, 'Oh, lady, look at this ! ' and ' Oh, lady, look at that 1 ' and ' Aint that fine, lady! ' So I clambered over the big heaps of earth, with part of my train wiggling on ahead, and the rest trailing behind in stumbling knots. I had got to the top of the highest embankment when I heard a screech. One little codger had been hurrying to catch up with us, and had stumbled. He bumped his nose, and I next saw him rolling over and over down the embankment. He did not fetch up until reaching the ditch. I couldn't help laughing, though I fear it wasn't very sympathetic. One of the girls hustled down and picked him up. She, in trying to wipe the dust off hastily smooched it over his face, and then dragged him up the slope by one of his arms, just as you'd pull a hand sled. MR. EAGLE-S U. S. A. "It was, really, the cutest pack I ever saw. Well, when we returned to the fence again, and they had got- ten me back over that, I managed to herd them to- gether, and said to the oldest girl, I guess she was about ten, 'Here's a dime and you get some candy for your crew.' " 'Oh thank you lady! Thank you!" and they scrambled back into the cart. The pony started with tow heads, legs, and arms sticking out in all direc- tions. As they went along, they kept waving their hands at me and shouting, 'Good bye lady I ' I strolled back to the hotel and every time, as they went up the hill toward Perrysburg, when they saw me look around at them,, they'd wave their hands to me." "Mother," said I, "you were more interested in those children than you were in Fort Meigs and all its history. " " I guess I was too," she replied OF RARE MANUFACTURE. TT TE had crossed the Maumee on the morning of \/y the fifteenth of August. It was raining — one of those slow, methodical, persistent drizzles, that tend to make the wayfarer in an unfamiliar region, feel bereft of all kinship and comfort. The clay roads were worked up into a sticky, waxy substance that made travel tedious and dispiriting. Desiring to get on the road as early as possible, we had started without breakfast and, by half-past seven, we were hungry. Finally, the rain stopped, and presently the sun actually showed himself. Never did two pilgrims accord him truer welcome. For a while, we were not so exercised over the craving for something to eat, and took a more active interest in the scenes about us. But not for long. Hunger will dominate, and, at last, we halted in front of a tiny cabin, much resembling a Swede farmer's place in Iowa, determined to make an effort to secure a cup of coffee, if nothing more. The location was about ten miles south of Toledo, and within a mile of a hamlet called Lime City, we being on the road leading in an easterly direction toward Fremont, the county seat of Sandusky county. A little man with closely cropped hair, checked shirt, blue overalls, and barefooted, was standing by the door, and. as we stopped, he came out to the roadway. "Could we get a little coffee and a bit of 86 MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. bread?" we asked. "We are traveling and will pay for the trouble. " "Well, I-I d-on't k-know", was the answer, as the little man put up his hand and dubiously scratched his head. "I-I d-don't know as we have got anything fit for a stranger. My wife has been sick and hasn't been able to keep much cooked up." I noticed by the pe- culiar burr that he had not been many years away from the hills of Wales. Also, that he was wonderfully clean. His blue overalls looked as if they had been run through the wringer and threshed until the threads had been worn white. His feet were as snowy as if they had been sandpapered. "Well now, if we can just get a little something, that will do, and we will try not to cause more bother than absolutely necessary, for we are really very hungry. " "Well, we'll try the best we can and get some coffee and eggs, but we haven't anything cooked up," and back he trotted toward the house, while I got out to hitch the horse. "A tall, thin woman appeared in the door-way and called out: " Better git down from the carriage, lady, and come right in. " " Oh no," answered mother, " if John may bring me a glass of milk and some bread, that will do for me." I went into the house and, in crossing the threshold, I noticed the little Welshman hustling around in the kitchen among the pots and pans getting the coffee. His wife said, " I've been sick a long time and haven't been able to do much cooking. I guess my husband has done more cooking than I hav^ for the past few months." Her wan, sallow face, and low, hacking cough bore out the truth of her statement. While MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 87 waiting, I had a chance to study the surroundings. The room had no papering, but the plastering was clean and there were no bits that had been knocked off by the careless tipping back of chairs. The pine floor- ing was spotless as scrubbing could make it. The window casings and mop-boards had been painted a dull drab, and they all seemed to have been lately scoured. The furniture was primitive, and consisted of three cheap chairs and a table. This latter was of pine, home-made, and had no cloth upon it. There was no picture in the room, and the only book was a small Bible. Then I glanced out of doors and over the yard in which not a spear of grass was to be seen, not a flower, nor a shrub. I took note of the fact that there was no porch above the door, and that the land for a half mile about, was low, and a sort of yellow clay. Yet, somehow, as I heard the little Welshman call- ing, " I.iz'beth, where is the sugar? " and " Liz'beth, where is the milk?" or "Liz'beth, ain't they some eggs?" for it appeared, man like, as if he had dififi- culty in finding anything, there was such a cheery tone in his voice that it changed the whole situation and made one feel that, after all, there was a happiness here that a good many of us mortals would be glad to possess. Soon the little Welshman hustled in with the coffee, and I heard a spluttering of the frying pan. In a mo- ment the three eggs were on the table, and, with a loaf of white bread and the coffee, I sat down to a most ex- cellenr breakfast. The eggs were none of your '53-ers, but genuine fruit of the year of grace, 1897. The ccffee was strong and bracing and the bread delicious. While I was eating, the thin wife stood by, with a big 88 MR. f,ac;lk's u. s. a. palm-leaf fan, driving off the flies, while her husband slipped out with a pitcher of milk and some buttered toast for mother. When I had finished, I offered the woman fifteen cents. But she wouldn't accept it! " No," she said, "if what we have given you was eatable, we are glad of it, but we really haiiit had anything cooked up. No, I don't want no pay for that little bite." I pressed the matter more urgently, still she refused. I went out to the road determined to make her husband take a quarter for what we had eaten. He was, also, unwilling to have the money and said over and over, " No, we don't want anything for that." I finally de- clared with some show of decision; " Now, here, you just take it and tell your wife to use it for pin money. " In rather a reluctant way, he let me drop the coin into his warty hand and, bidding us "Good bye," trotted back to the house. I had just got into the phaeton when out hurried our little Welshman again, and exclaimed: "My wife says thi-s is too much. She says if you was bound to pay, that ten cents is enough ! " Then followed an- other argument, but I was obdurate this time, and as mother was saying, "I wish we could give you five dollars," we started on. If ever people needed money, that couple did. There was no opportunity for their playing upon our sympa- thies in the hope of imposing upon us at some future time, for they knew we both were traveling and they should never see us again. The only reasonable con- clusion was that their actions were literally in accord- ance with their principles As we drove along, we discussed this incident and mother declared, "John, I'd rather be as poverty-stricken as that Welsh couple MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. go and as contented in the exact adherence to the promp- tings of my conscience, than be king of a great realm." "Yes," I replied, "if there is such a thing as the final round-up of the good and bad, those two will have a pew all to themselves right down in the Amen corner of the Elect." IN OHIO OIL FIELDS. WE were driving along, late in the forenoon of August 15th, toward Woodville, in Sandusky county. It was beginning to get dusk and we to get interested in finding out just where we were to stop for the night. Gradually, there came to our nos- trils a peculiar, sickening, all-pervading odor, and soon, in looking ahead of us, we could see the open land and the woods marked by the derricks of the oil wells. They dotted the land like so many monuments. We counted twenty-five in a space of scarcely two acres. The sight of these tall, quadrangular structures, to- gether with the beams and boards lying about, made the territory look as if order and contentment had been forever abolished. The whole region seemed as if it had been trampled over, and torn up, until a blade of grass had no right to exist. The air was awfully heavy, and the smell of oil overpowering. It was ex- actly the smell that the "packing" used about the axles of car wheels and machinery possesses. Oil was on the surface of the water in the ditches along the road. It encrusted the pools in the wagon track, for it had rained that morning. The engine houses near the derricks bore great black stains on their sides. You heard nothing but the slow glug-glug, glug-glug, that the walking beams at the scores of derricks made as they methodically bumped up and down. MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 91 We passed a lot of boarding houses. They were built like long barns, and their oil-soaked, unpainted clap-boards evinced their hasty construction. Groups of husky, bearded fellows in red shirts were standing about, after their hard day's work. Some were wash- ing the grease from their faces and arms; others were slouched down on oak benches sucking away at clay pipes. The fogginess and the gradually-approaching night made the surroundings appear as if, after just leaving the region of small but comfortably-tenanted farms, we had stepped into a region where the sun never shone, and all you could see, smell, hear and taste was oil. Three years ago, Woodville was a ham- let. Now, it has 2,000 population. When we got into the place, we saw that brick buildings lined either side of the way. In the town, all was bustle and bab- ble. Men in laboring garb were on the sidewalk and in the street. Most of them wore straps about their waists and pipes in their countenances. The general suggestion was as if a cloud of railway track layers had decended upon the spot, ready to remain a few weeks and then be off to another camp, miles away. With all its brick buildings and its air of improvised progress, Woodville had no public hotel, or boarding house. We got accommodations by piecemeal, secur- ing a place for our horse up on a side street where the only attendants about the barn were a pack of dirty- faced boys with heavy wads of "plug" stowed away within their freckled cheeks, and whose noisy impu- dence tended to give out the impression that the livery had all the patronage it desired without taking in an- other steed. We got supper at a dirty restaurant, and some dirty rooms over a dirty bakery. Early in the evening, I put out to look over this MR RAGLE'S U. S. A. grease-smeared town. The saloons were doing a good business, but a street fakir was doing better. This fel- low was a genius in his way. He was tall and thin. His nose was long and sharp, as was also his chin. His jet-black hair was worn to about the rim of his celluloid collar. A black Prince Albert and rusty, silk hat made his personality fit three types of character; the "lead- ing man " of a "repertory show," a country preacher, or a country politician. The man's capital lay in his mouth. In the two hours that he stood on that wagon, extolling his wares, it certainly seemed as if he used up all the words in the dictionary, and several thousand more. He began with electric belts at fifty cents a piece, and ran the gamut of prices until, at the last of his harangue, he was lauding five-cent tooth brushes. After one of his paralyzing periods, he paused to mop the perspiration off his neck and get breath. As he scraped away with his tattered silk handkerchief, he said : "My folks wanted me to be a Methodist preacher. Wouldn't I 'a been a peach? " The oil region of today comprises a vastly different territory than it did twenty years ago. It was then supposed that Pennsylvania was to always be the stronghold of this industry, but time and test have shown that you can't point out the probability of lo- cating oil with anything like the readiness even that you can a silver or gold mine. Men drill and they "strike it," and they "don't strike it." Geologists and practical experts have tried to formulate rules of probabilities but they have made none that are a cer- tain guide. The farmer who is having an artesian well sunk on his premises sometimes hits a flow of oil. or gas, and that is about all that can be said with positiv- MR KAGI.K'S U. S. A 93 ism. The oil fields of New York and Pennsylvania comprise less than 400 square miles, and the fields are widely scattered through various portions of those States. The development of this industry is gradually moving westward and it is but a few years since the wonderfully productive Ohio fields have been opened up. This territory may be bounded by starting at a point some ten miles south of Toledo, in Wood couniy, going southeast, taking in the counties of Sandusky, Seneca, Wyandot; then southwest over Hardin, Au- glaize, Mercer, VanWert, Allen, PutnUm, and Hancock. This is the principal area of the field, though the extreme northwestern portion of the State is being prospected to some extent. Over in Allen county, at Lima, is the territory that has made Cal. Brice, his hair, and his millions. The whole area of this oil territory is about 160 square miles. It is but a little over thirteen years ago that oil was developed at Lima, yet as early as July, 1886, that field was averaging 1 100 barrels daily! The people who own, or did own, the ground on which the newer oil fields are being developed show that they have profited by the widespread stories of the experiences attending the early discoveries in Keystonedom. They have little notions of the "Coal- Oil Johnny" business. They employ all energies to secure the utmost from their opportunities, and demand for land, before valued at $75 per acre, prices ranging from $300 to $900. They get them, too. Northern and western Ohio are peopled largely by those of German descent, and their native conservatism has easily kept them from being made crazy by prospects of speedy'wealth. They don't go to fine horses and fast Iiving,'but to the bank, and continue to wear the same 94 MR. EAGLE'S U S. A. old straw hats and blue overalls. I was talking with a groceryman in Woodville. "There," said he, "is Adam," pointing to a character of advanced years sitting, a short distance up the street on, a watering trough, and placidly smoking a corn-cob, " Adam who ? " I asked. " Don't know. I forget his name at the tail end. ' Adam,' that's what everybody calls him 'round here. Three years ago, he had a few acres of ground and was raising truck for a living. He's got lashuns o' dough now. More'n $300,000, I 'spect." I went up and began talking to "Adam," but he sententiously told me to "Clear out!" I tried to explain, but he dove into his port trousers pocket, and was hauling forth something that looked like a revolver of the most sanguinary variety as he said in more pro- nounced cadence, "Git!" I complied. I found, through others, that "Adam" had been pestered so much, of late, by bunco men that his heart had grown slightly calloused toward strangers. As the boundaries of the oil region have changed, so have the methods of drilling and disposing of the prod- uct. Hundreds of engines and valuable devices have been contrived so that, today, a well 2,000 feet deep, can be drilled for less money than one of 500 feet in the early '70's. These inventions cover almost all possible phases of the labor. A drill may get fastened in the earth, hundreds of feet below the surface, yet there are appliances that can readily catch hold of the drill, unloosen it, and bring the instrument triumph- antly to the surface. Ingenious couplings for drills have been planned, hence little time is lost in making connections. In fact, there is scarcely a detail that has not been changed. The drilling and equipping of MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 95 an oil well is, however, no inexpensive undertaking, for the average will represent an expenditure of $3,000, and requires from fifteen to thirty days time. " Piping " is a system that has revolutionized the oil industry and made the teamster and canal-boatman obsolete. Cast iron pipes are laid below ground and convey the crude product to various points hundreds of miles distant. To keep them up to fullest capacity, pumping stations are located at regular intervals along the line. The plan of connecting the wells by an arrangement of wooden tumbling rods and making one engine do the work of several at the same time is among the newest and most valuable devices in vogue. This simply consists of light oaken shafts of about thirty feet in length, hinged together and connected with the walking-beams of six or seven wells. This has proven a great saving in time and expense. Like many a timely invention, the wonder is nobody ever thought of it before. Six men are required in managing a well and they have to be fellows of intelligence and vigor. No weakling is wanted in handling the drills that weigh a hundred pounds to a section, as well as the numerous big beams and bars used. In none of the great indus- trial localities will you find more magnificent types of workingmen. Lusty, broad-shouldered six-footers, they are very Titans in strength and endurance. THE BIRTH PLACE OF THE WIZARD. ./ TADISON'S fool" — that was the complimentary P title old Sam. Edison's boy, Tom, used to bear at Milan, Ohio. The lad, as an aged resident expressed it, "was alius tinkerin' and wan't a mite like other young ones." People were hon- est in the belief that this freckled youngster was "a leetle off," and his sobriquet naturally followed. To- day, the first thing that is told the stranger who drops into this little and obscure hamlet in Erie county is: "This is where Edison was born." The name is ut- tered with pride, respect, nay, even with almost rev- erence. Milan was once a thrifty town, doing a big business in river trade and the handling of farm products. It was at the height of its prosperity when Thomas A. Edison was born here in 1847. The building of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern R. R., a few miles south, made Norw^lk the live town, and, from that time, Milan was doomed. Only about three hundred people inhabit the place now. The small, one-story, brick house in which Edison was born is still standing, and residents love to point it out. The structure is in a good state of repair, and looks much as it did when the embryo genius lived in it, and was the butt of neighborhood ridicule. An old barn near by is also shown as the place where Edison's first laboratory was MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. 97 located. His pieces of wire, cans, and tools could not be left about the house for they were always being dis- turbed, either by members of his own home, or prying visitors. So, at last, in desperation, he rigged up a workshop under this barn. There, he had a surprising array of contrivances. This place, also, proved speedily of great interest to townspeople, who would pounce in upon him every little while "just to see what he was up to. " The lad could not abide their ag- gravating investigations and hateful badgering. So he planned to stop it. One day, the boy went out and left the old door purposely ajar. He hid close by and watched. A man soon came along, opened the door and, in poking around among the traps on the rude work-bench, picked up a coil of copper wire. He let out a yell that was heard clear to the post-office. Tommy rushed in and turned off the current. Hence- forth, he was not troubled by guests. They told me how, during the night of the Presiden- tial election of 1856, a crowd had started to go down to Norwalk six miles south to get the returns. Nine-year-old " Edison's fool " was along. While the assemblage was waiting in the telegraph office for the operator to come, many of the men were placing bets. A man who was about to put fifty dollars on Fremont felt a pull at his coat sleeve, and, looking around, saw " Edison's fool." "Better not bet that way," said the lad. "Fre- mont's beat ! " "What the devil do you know about it? " was the surprised and half-angry rejoinder. "Cause he is," maintained the boy stoutly. "Why mister, I kin read what comes over them tickers just like you kin writin'! " 98 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. The man persisted, however. When the operator arrived, and made the announcement, it was found that " Edison's fool " had stated the fact. Fremont was defeated. Shortly after leaving Milan, we came, at a distance of three miles, to Berlin Village. A campaign " rally " was in progress, and the town was full of people. A couple of brass bands were on hand, and had been pounding away for all they were worth, when " Cyclone Davis," the "Kansas Populist," arose from a hastily improvised platform and began to speak. It was an awfully hot afternoon, and as- "Cyclone" got under way, he removed his coat, to give him an air of "com- monness," and, at the same time, more comfort. Presently, he unbuttoned his vest. Then, he unfas- tened his collar. The sun came down hotter and hot- ter. As " Cyclone" sailed into " those blood-sucking vampires, the trusts," and told of " Mark Hanna's mil- lions, wrung from the brow of overburdened slaves," he was perspiring like a Turkish bath. He tore off his cuffs and threw them into a chair. Things were be- ginning to get interesting. "Cyclone" talked and talked. Finally, a share of his hearers grew tired of standing in the heat and drew away where they could huddle down under shade trees. "Cyclone" picked up a palm-leaf fan, and assumed a position of dogged determination, showing he meant to finish if it took until next morning. At length, one of his hearers in- terposed an objection to a certain remark. The orator magnanimously declined to notice the critic who, in- spired by his first success, soon fired another question, but with no more effect. A third time, he tried it. "Cyclone " paused long enough to hurl a mouthful of statistics at his tormentor. The crowd cheered its ap- A CYCLONE IN ACTION. MR. EAGLE'S U. 5. A. 99 proval and, feeling encouraged, the compaigner de- clared: " My friend, you make me think of a chap out in my State that got full, and wobbled over to the depot in a little town to see the train come in. The platform was crowded with folks, and pretty soon this feller got up in front of some men and says he: 'I k'n lick any man, hie, 'n thish blame town, kin!' Nobody noticed him, an' he set across the street for another drink. He come back after awhile an' says, ' I-I k'n lick any man 'n thish dam county!' He swung his arms, and sloshed around, but folks wasn't going to fuss with a fool like that, an' he took trail for more liquor. Well, sure's you live, he come back once more an' got right plumb in front of a strappin' twenty-year- old farm boy, 'n says this time : ' I k'n lick any man that lives in th' hull State o' Kansas! I — ' when biff! an' this belligerent cuss was a rolling off the platform, and fetched up in a puddle. At last, he got to his feet, an' as he was digging the mud from his eyes, he says: ' Gem'len, I took in too much territory that last trip ! ' " WILSON'S MILLS. IN Ohio, we entered a more broken stretch of coun- try and, at the same time, began to find a people who felt the grinding heel of hard times — the hard times that had been gradually growing harder and harder through a series of years — the times that had been wrestled with, and fought against, with the deter- mined energy, the thrifty habits, and the brawn of the race of farmers who had been tillers of the sod for gen- erations. It was here that we found the farmer with his wife and children picking grapes in their many-acred vineyards, and laying them carefully in boxes and bas- kets, then taking them in wagons to the markets of Cleveland and Toledo, and selling them for one cent a pound. " Does that pay? " we asked. "Oh no," was the tired answer. "We can't get a living by it any more. We used to. But with other truck, it helps us out. An awful lot o' hard work to keep up a vineyard. To be shore, we don't need a great sight o' money. AV^e raise everything to eat ex- cept our groceries. Them and the taxes is what beat us. " The first bit of real mountain grandeur that came in our way was near what is known as " Wilson's Mills," in Cuyahoga county. We had taken the river road, as they called it, and had glided along a gradual slope of MR. EAGLES U S A. lOI a couple of miles that was delightfully enjoyable, with the smooth easy roll of wheel and soft hoof beats, and the views of the valley below. We were not long, how- ever, in discovering troubles ahead in the shape of steam saw-mills (Kit's particular abomination) standing close to bridges over which we must pass; narrow, stony roads, dark with over-hanging boughs of forest trees, and the uncomfortable, not to say dangerous, nearness of an occasional sportsman who made the woods resound with his shots, startling Kit, and mak- ing her so nervous she was ready to jump at the slight- est noise. This so interfered with our pleasure that we speedily determined to get out into the sunlight even if we did have to climb steep hills. Moreover, there was nothing especially interesting in groping along this thickly wooded valley, so we took the first branching road to the left, and immediately began pulling up a steep incline. Kit was so eager to get out of this uncanny place that, as soon as she turned into the branching road, she gathered all her strength, lay back her pointed ears, dug her iron toes into the rocky soil, and started to run up the hill. We could not help laughing at the vim with which she started for the up- per regions, although we allowed her to have her way for only a few rods, when we called a halt, and John alighted. I remained in the phaeton, and soothing her down into a moderate walk, I let her go on for perhaps half a mile, until we came to a little open space in the woods that was comparatively level. " I am going to get out here," I called to John, who was slightly in advance. "You take care of Kit. She walks too fast for me. I want to enjoy some of the views from this hill, and rather walk." ,02 ^^- EAGLE'S U. S. A. "All right," said John calmly, and then to Kit: "Come on, Mrs. Kit-Kat. We'll leave mother to browse here in the woods." Beside the way were tangles of blackberry bushes, budding golden-rod, and purple asters, — a sight 1 had not seen in seventeen years. I stopped and looked at them, touching the prickly things lovingly. Then, I sat down on a big granite boulder and looked about me, — at the string of stone wall against which the blackberry bushes grew closely; at the white, stony road; then at the trees on the other side of the stone wall, beeches, spruces, and hemlock. I thought of the little palm-like boughs I used to gather from the hem- locks back in New Hampshire and make into brooms for household sweeping. They were good for floors, and as for carpets, we were not bothered by them. " I have indeed left the West behind me! " I said to myself aloud, rising reluctantly and slowly moving on- ward. "The West with all its vast opportunities for money-getting. I begin to feel myself contract under the old pinching poverty of New England already. The sight of those hemlock boughs brings it all back to me — the sunny days in early November when I used to fling a rope over my shoulder and go over through the cattle lane into the pasture to gather our Winter's sup- ply of broomstuff." I saw myself collecting as much as I could carry, making a slip-noose of my rope, placing my bundle of hemlock within, drawing the noose tightly, then fling- ing the load on to my back after the fashion of the pack-peddler, and trudging homeward. Day after day was this continued until thq cellar held a good big heap of fragrant green, which was to serve for brooms,^ and for covering potatoes and apples in the cold MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 103 weather to prevent them from freezing. How every- thing found a use there!" I continued reflectively. Bits of woolen cloth were saved to patch mittens in Winter. Every tiny piece of cotton was hoarded for quilts, and everything that could be turned to no other end was worked into rugs. After this fashion my thoughts drifted as 1 slowly climbed nearly to the top of the hill that was more than a mile in length. Then, a knoll, thickly covered with dwarf, white asters tempted me to a little rest. I turned and was about to drop down upon the fairy couch when a burst of landscape came upon my view that, for a moment, made my heart stop beating. "-The Spirit that drvelleth among the hills'' was there. I felt its presence. In that first sweep of the eye, I stood in silent, reverential awe, while my gaze traveled abroad over the wide, green valley below, to the tiers of circling mountain chains that lifted themselves to the skies away in the farthest distance. I saw the river gHnting through the trees with a sort of frosty blue as it zig-zagged along the valley. I saw, as a part of the whole ground-work, occasional openings where buzzing, whirring mills added their peculiar touches of pictur- esqueness. But no description of the material beauty and harmoay of the scene could touch the greater charm of it all, the spiritual, that enthralls the senses and fills the soul with an indescribable content. It banishes the troubles that haunt us, the doubts, and fears, and forebodings of ill that are forever on oui- track, striving to turn into gall our happiest moments Even the dread of death is so illuminated by the subtle Presence that it seems to us only the ''golden portal" through which we painlessly enter the "Perfect Life." 'J'hrough all the avenues of sensation steals the wonder- I04 MR. FAGI.F.''; T-. S A. ful influence, until every nerve is intoxicated with the soul's happiness. Human interests, associations and pleasures, slink away, and away, till we no longer take note of their existence. Something far more satisfying has crept into our lives, and taken possession of us. It speaks to us in a thousand ways. Its many keyed voices are all about us. We listen to the soft whisper- ings among the trees, the shrubs, the grasses, and our hearts understand. It is "the Spirit that dwelleth among the hills" — "Mother, Mother I " John is calling in the distance, "Do come. It's almost sunset ! " The suddenness of the interruption for a minute al- most dazed me I mechanically gathered myself up from the crushed asters on which I had been sitting, and began to climb the steep ascent. The sensation of thus falling from my lofty flight to the rough, rocky road was not in the least agreeable. For several min- utes I could hardly locate myself. My feet felt queerly, and I seemed to make no progress as I endeavored to plod on. The fact that we were several miles distant from any village, and that there was no way of know- ing how long it would be before we should find a farm- er's family who could, or wcnild accommodate us with lodgings, made no impression upon me. I forgot I was mortally afraid of driving after dark, and that there was very fair prospect of our now being obliged to do so. At last, I reached the top of the hill, and as I came around a curve in the road, I saw Kit nibbling a beech twig, and John lazily stretched upon the green turf. As soon as I came in sight, John arose, and pushing back his light felt hat, placed his left hand upon his side, while he began flapping b'S right hand and foot in uni- MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. lOS son like a bird's wing, keeping time to the indescrib- able swing of " Great Hey Rube," as he burst out with: " One day last Spring, I believe in May, Old Cy Perkins to me did say. Says he th' circus is come tew town. An' what dew ye say 'f we see the claown? " I laughed. I always laughed when he sang this ab- surd stuff. It was the staple nonsense of our journey. If I were tired, or blue, or discouraged, that comically flapping hand and foot, that rollicking tune so like the rollicking words, was sure to break the dismal spell with a care free laugh. If a threshing engine must be passed, or a dangerous railroad crossing braved, and John knew I was inwardly quaking with fear, his lively: " Well, old lady, what dew ye say 'f we see the claown? " never failed to make the danger seem less serious, and call forth, at last, a ghost of a smile. There was such an extensive repertoire of poetry (?) comprised in this song that it never became monotonous. As John said, there were yards and yards of it, and it would require several weeks to go through it, if sung on the install- ment plan. Besides, if one should exhaust the regular rigmarole, it was so easy to manufacture stanzas to suit the occasion. "The grandest of anything yet!" I exclaimed as soon as I could get breath. "John" (pathetically), "I do wonder how I have lived away from the moun- tains, and especially, the God of the Mountains, for so many years ! " John stopped singing, straightened up, and looked at me (quizzically, then, "You really don't say!" he drawled. " Yes, John, I do say. I never get so near the Infa- Io6 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A nite Presence as I do among the hills. I feel an actual communication with the sou/ oi the material world. I have gotten back over nineteen years. I am young again ! " "Then let's see how lively you can jump into that phaeton. It'll soon be dark as pitch ; then you'll think uf nothing but threshing machines and rail-roads." "Oh, John, for once, I did actually forget them!" I exclaim, hurriedly climbing into the carriage. "What if we had to dig a living from among these rocks? ' John bye and bye remarked, as we jogged on our way. " That would take the romance out of you, I guess. For my part, I'd rather see fields of corn stretching away over level prairies for miles, and miles, and know that hard times or soft, banks breaking or making, two feet of the richest soil of the globe lay beneath my feet, than, find the hoe striking fire from these barren hills, where even a spear of grass scarce dares to push up ! " " But yonder are extensive vineyards," I reply, "and they look as if they were loaded with fruit." "Yes, but those vineyards mean a vast amount of work with next to nothing for pay. Why, they told me back in Fremont, that one could buy the best quality of grape wine for forty cents per gallon! Think of all the work that means! No wonder the women have to wear patch-work dresses of three-cent calico, and at meals, the families can't get a slice of meat from one week to another! " "I must admit, John, I do not see how they keep up their strength and work on the kind of food they have. We have found few farmer's families since we left Indiana that had anything but fried fat pork for meat. I am famished now for a bit of beef steak. It MR. EAGLE'S U. S A. 107 seems as if they might have some eggs with their pork." "They have to sell their eggs to get their pro- visions," put in John. " ' Necessaries,' as they used to say in New Hampshire. I prophesy you get nothing but bread and butter, weak tea, with, maybe, a bite of gingerbread for supper tonight. They don't even have a cup of coffee. The coal miners in Illinois have a hundred per cent, more nourishing food than these people who own fairly large farms." "The high living of the poor people struck me with surprise when I first went West," I answer. " In fact, they seemed to have extravagant ways in almost every- thing; really and positively wasteful. Now, coming East again, what used to seem ordinary frugality, im- presses me as very uncomfortable poverty. "You wouldn't get such a rig as that farmer's wife wore where we took dinner today on any Western wo- man who could scrape together fifty cents by washing or any other means; be assured of that! " said John with emphasis. " Her skirt was old brown calico, her waist of faded pink calico, and her sleeves of black cambric; but I must say," he added, "she was neat as a pin, and an exceedingly lady-like, intelligent woman. Why in the world don t these people sell what they've got and get out of here! that's what I want to know." "Sell!" and I laughed. "Seeing their condition, who would buy? They would have to nearly give their places away, or abandon them to waste, as we have found some on the way have done. "It's pitiful " John replied, " to see men past middle life staggering along with mortgaged farms, when you hardly find a farm-owner in Illinois, past forty-five, who has not gained a fair competency. Why, our villages Io8 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. out there are made up principally of retired farmers. They seldom work very hard after they are fifty. But, I'm afraid the low price of grain in the West this year will be a set back to immigration and thus check ad- vancement of the price of land." "The price may not advance, but it will not decrease in Illinois nor Iowa. Those States are settled on too firm a basis for that," I said decisively. " In the West, they have big crops ('overproduction,' as the Populists love to call it), and low prices; in the East, it's small crops and low prices. As long as the income of the West continues to maintain its superior ratio with the income of the East, as it has done thus far, how can it receive a set back on account of low prices? " WitI - out pausing for John to answer, I added, "The prices are extremly low fc^r farm produce' all over the country, but they maintain their accustomed ratio, one section with another." John thought for a moment in silence, and I had quite arrived at the conclusion that I had settled the whole question, when he disturbed my self-compla- cency with: "You must remember that the laboring farmers throughout the West are, in the main, renters of the land they cultivate. They are largely of foreign na- tionality, and own very little, usually nothing, besides their teams and farming implements. When a partial crop failure comes, or year of exceptionally low prices, they can not sell enough farm produce to pay their rent and have sufficient left to keep themselves and families in comfort. Too often, the landlords demand their rent promptly, and in full ; they seize the tenant's stuff, sell it off, and the renter is left to suffer. Such cases are fairly numerous. Associated Press correspon- MR. EAGLE'S U S, A. 109 dents in the Western villages spread the items as much as possible for a ' space bill, ' and they go to the Chicago papers From here, the matter is given another pad- ding, and fired on East. The ' plate ' concerns dish it over again, and it makes up the ' ready print ' material ».)f the country papers circulating from Ohio throughout the East, and Southeast. The farmers of these sec- tions read this stuff, and conclude that the West really produces only grass-hoppers, floods, and mortgages. Therefore, they are determined to regard all men v/ho speak of the West as skilled falsifiers, and remain con- vinced that the West is Tophet in varioloid form. They feel aclually thankful to remain astride of the rocks and be unseduced by the prairie loam. Such being the case, I believe the present low prices will still fur- ther aid in retarding immigration." "I grant, John, that the prevailing low prices are a set back to enterprise and business ventures throughout the country, but the Western States will hold over, where the Eastern can not, on account of the superior abundance of their crops. There is a vast difference between having low prices and being unable to raise anything of consequence in crops, and having a soil that will shoot up the corn and oats, filling the bins, be prices low or high. The great stores of corn, oats, hay, cattle, horses, hogs, give people out there secu- rity for a good living. The truth is that there has been so much said by campaigners about ' mortgaged farms,' and said, not because people were starving, but because they were not in the condition they had once been, that those who know nothing of the general facts in the West, immediately conclude, as you say, that the farmers out there are tenfold worse off than they are here. " A. S. A. ORIGINAL SHRINE OF MORMON ISM. SOLEMN, massive, and weather stained, it stands on its seven hills, apparently to remain for all time a monument to the memory of the greatest, maddest craze in the name of Religion that has ever taken place in this country. Such is the appearance today of the famous Mormon Temple which Joseph Smith caused to be built at Kirtland, in 1834. If the occupants of the little cemetery near this structure could arise, or if the great thick walls of the building itself could articulate, they would tell shock- ing stories of fanatical insanity — how many a fevered zealot gave his lands, his home, and his all, to provide funds for the building of the Temple. No money, or labor, was spared in an effort to make it a building that should long endure the storms and buffetings of the years. The furnishings were costly, and more than one farm went to buy walnut, or rosewood "thrones," "sanctuaries," or carvings. Under the influence of the man who was chief in the rearing of this edifice, respectable farmer families were thrown into turmoil. Husbands left their wives and children, mothers deserted their homes, and babes were placed in the poor-house. The end came when Joseph Smith was compelled to flee the State of Ohio. The Temple was all that was left behind. It is to be seen now, after a lapse of sixty-two years, in as solid and lasting a condition as the day it was completed. MR. EAGLE'S U S. A. HI It was in 1830 that Smith appeared in Kirtland, and with his coming there was a social revolution, the like of which Ohio had never witnessed. Smith had with him about thirty worshipers, and their ways filled the staid residents of Lake county, at first, with disgust. But the Prophet's talking soon had its effect. He gained a few converts, and the rest was easy. Women became fairly infatuated with Joseph, who, if his pic- tures hanging today in the homes of Kirtland are any indication of what he looked like, was certainly a hand- some, vigorous man. The females influenced hus- bands and brothers, and the wily stranger owned the town. Smith, from the start, showed remarkably shrewd financial ability. He persistently dwelt upon the virtue of giving, and Joseph magnanimously managed the funds for the powers above. He started a bank. Money was issued, and it was not long until the coun- try was flooded with his notes. His followers had ab- solute faith, and farmers kept getting converted and turning their acres into dollars to be placed in Smith's bank. All along, the new-comer was collecting funds for the building of a great " Temple of Worship. " "A Store House of the Lord," he called it. The building was begun in 1831 and, by 1834, was completed. The location is a beautiful one. It looks off over a valley in which is nestled the village of Kirtland, with its neat white cottages and neighboring farm-houses. Up beyond the series of hills to the north, and distant about five miles, a broad, deep-blue band marks the stretch of Lake Erie. To the east is Little Mountain a picturesque and wooded slope. Off southward is Gildersleeve Mountain. The farms and the vineyards 112 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. that dot the landscape help make as attractive a finish to the view as could be desired. The first performance toward construction was to lay the foundation on seven small ridges, or hills, in imitation of the Rome of old. The dimensions of the Temple were about 50 by 125 feet. It was slow work putting up the walls, for the stone had to be quarried and hauled some distance, as Smith was bound that the enduring rock should go into his sacred establishment. 'I'he walls were built two feet thick clear to the roof, and so carefully were the seams laid that the mortar is as perfect now as when made. The edifice was at last completed and, to Smith adherents, the event was a momentous one. Well it might be, for about forty families had been made poor as crows. Their houses and cattle had gone into the stone walls and costly finishings. On the out- side, and facing the east, was placed this inscription: STORE HOUSE OF THE LORD. CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER DAY SAINTS. 1834. The work was completed, and, with a considerable amount of money at hand, there was no reason why Smith might not have run things for an indefinite time, had he not simply gone riotous with amorous capers. It was Smith's vices with women that began to make things warm for him and eventually drove him from MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. "3 Kirtland. His illicit loves in different towns where he was exploiting his doctrines, and the variegated scenes that took place in the Temple, caused dissensions among some of his followers. Smith's "spiritual wives" grew so numerous that certain of the townsfolk of Kirtland, even as early as 1832, decided to take action. (Jn May 22, of that year. Smith, together with Sidney Rigdon, was taken out at night and given a dose of tar and feathers as a testimonial of the esteem in which they were held. Smith's propensities for wandering in forbidden fields were not daunted by tar and feathers. He still stuck to Kirtland, kept preach- ing his " Book of Mormon," and gathering in a " spir- itual wife " now and then. The financial crash that came with the failure of the Kirtland bank was the last straw. The Kirtland public was terribly enraged, for many Gentiles had deposited funds in the institution purely as a matter of business. Smith ran away, with a few followers, into Missouri. Then the remainder of the Kirtland Mormons found themselves in a pitiful state. They were without money, and most of them without homes. The county had to take care of the majority of the unfortunates. The power of Smith's personality is shown by the fact that some of his female worshipers made off, and braved the perils of a desolate trip over the prairies that they might again see the features of the " Prophet." After Smith's departure, the Temple gradually fell into disuse. For several years, this splendid edifice, which had cost over $40,000, stood on the hill-top in silent grandeur, deserted and forsaken. Finally, when the town was in need of a school house, the upper, or third story, was given over to the charge of a wielder of birch and rule. It thus served for some years. 114 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. About i860, there was an attempt to re-organize the former believers of Joseph Smith at Kirtland. These new propagandists rejected the idea of polygamy, or, at least, they did not see fit to try it again in Ohio. A religious association was established under the name, "Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints." The tenets are essentially the same as those of the Utah Mormons, with the exception of polygamy. Proselyting has been vigorously carried on in all parts of the world, and today, it is said, the members of this denomination number 27,000. The head of this sect is Joseph Smith Jr., a son of the man killed by the Illi- nois mob. The headquarters are in Lamoni, Iowa. Soon after reorganizing, the Temple was re-opened to regular worship, and it has been maintained until the present. Of course the Utah and Kirtland Mormons were bound to clash, and this squabble culminated, a few years ago, in a law suit concerning the ownership of the Kirtland Temple. It was a good thing for the lawyers, at least, as the cause went to the Supreme Court of Ohio, which finally decided in favor of the Kirtland branch. A visit to the Temple as it now exists is fraught with much of interest to the stranger. The interior is about as it was when built. On the first floor is the main au- dience room. The walls and ceiling are painted white, with no border or effort to relieve the sombre effect. The body of the large room is filled with walnut benches. The railing about the seats is very high, and a door leads to each pew. These doors have locks, or catches, so that, when closed, whoever is speaking is reasonably sure of holding his audience. At either end of the room, namely, the east and west, a series of elevated thrones, rising one above the other, mark the MR. EAGLE'S D. S. A. "5 position during worship occupied by the dignitaries of Joseph Smith's reign. Rows of hooks in the ceiling show how the curtains which were once used were arranged to divide the floor into four apartments. The floor above is bare and desolate looking. About sixty chairs placed here indicate that it is used as a sort of lecture hall, but, in the days of Smith, curtains divided this apartment just as below. Rollers fastened to the ceiling of this second floor, together with a sys- tem of pulleys, enabled the operator to raise or lower the curtains of both first and second floors at the same time. In the third story, several partitions running north and south make a lot of separate chambers. It is a matter of tradition that in them many amorous or- gies happened once upon a time. The "Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," which worships in this Temple now, tries, so one of its lilders informed me, to follow literally the " Book of Mormon," which, be it known, prohibits po- lygamy. This convenient doctrine of plural wives was one of Smith's "revelations." It usually happened that when Smith felt like doing a thing, he had a handy " revelation " take place, to strengthen up his system, we may suppose. The polygamy feature was added by the genial Joseph, and perpetuated by Brig- ham Young with the Utah band. In speaking of his religion, the white haired Elder who showed me through this building, and a most courteous and suave old fellow he was, by the way, told, me that "they had all the blessings of all the other religions, and a great deal more." He informed me that, among other notions, the Kirtland "Saints" of today, hold that miracles are worked, now, exactly as the Bible tells of Il6 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. them; that healing can be performed by the "laying on of hands," and that " revelations " frequently grace their leaders. The literal coming of Christ for the second time is also believed in. The government of the sect is according to the Biblical plan of a President, Councillors, Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors, and Teachers. This sect deifies Joseph Smith, despite his polygamy and all. Though I had just talked with a lot of resi- dents who remembered the real Smith days, my old Elder said: "It is all a mistake. " WITH THE DYNAMO. W. R. C. HOME. ARE New York and Chicago to be ultimately connected by an electric railway? If the towns along the line of the Lake Shore and New York Central keep extending their street rail- way systems, as they have for the past few years, and Toledo, Cleveland, and Buffalo promoters live up to their promises, this will be most certainly the result. So that one can hop aboard at Chicago and keep on getting "transfers" until he lands in New York. It will require but a surprisingly small extension of extra track to make possible this very thing. I was in Painesville the day the electrics made their first public trip from that place thirty miles eastward to Cleveland. The cars were crowded. The prospects were that the lively business would endure, for the fare was about one-half what it would be on the Lake Shore, or " Nickel Plate," and there was the added delight of a ride along beautiful country roads. Of course, the time was much slower, about an hour and a half being required, but your village dweller isn't exercised about that. An extra hour spent in this way is no delay to him. The farmer finds the electric the handiest thing imaginable. Think of it! After you finish hoe- ing, to go into the kitchen, change your blue frock for a conventional coat, walk out to the curb, and jaunt into the city as loftily as you please for five cents! Il8 MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. Farm life and city life united ! For about ten days the cars had been running from Willoughby, eleven miles east, and the first Saturday, when usually sixty tickets were sold, not a solitary paste-board was handed out at either the "Nickel Plate," or Lake Shore depots. The country merchants and steam-road folk were weeping on the same handkerchief. At Painesville, I was told that the merchants were going to hold an indignation meeting, so excited were they over the knowledge that even their small sales of thread and tape would be a thing of the past owing to the mad rush to Cleveland, "bargain day." All along through Northern Indiana, Southern Michigan, and each way, east and west of Toledo and Sandusky, run the elec- tric lines. The promoter will soon connect them and, with the air ship, travel between Chicago and New York will be subject to the whims of the tourist. On these long routes, handsome coaches are used. They are nearly as heavy as the steam cars, and quite as nicely appointed. They run almost noiselessly, and hence, the objections of farmers to them on the score of scaring their horses, unused to "city fixins, " are largely obviated. The jaunt along the shore of Lake Erie eastward, we found truly delightful. For mile after mile, our way was along a sort of "ridge" road that led past splendidly kept farms. The pastures in which fat, sleek Jerseys nibbled, were so green and clean! Scarcely a weed was to be discovered. The farm houses, painted glistening white, were surrounded by large, cleanly kept red barns and out buildings. Stately elms stood in the yards, and ruddy faced, bright eyed young folk were to be seen about. Then, a mile or so to the north of us. just over the tree tops, MR. EAGLE'S U, S. A. 119 the placid blue of Erie, dotted here and there with the sails of yachts, or lumber sloops, furnished poetic re- lief to the agricultural scenes. I wonder if this Arcadia has not had a deep effect upon the natures of its dwellers; if this peaceful, substantial, fertile plain by the waters is entirely disconnected with the fact that from this region have come so many men known to the industrial, military, and executive history of our country. At Mentor the sombre white house among the trees tells of Garfield. There were the Paines from whom Painesville is named. Julius C. Burrows, the Michigan Senator, was a Painesville lad. At Perry, the next town east of Painesville, Senator Allison, the Iowa statesman, was born, as also Gen. Wm. L. Stoughton, of Michigan, and at Madison, still eastward, among others were reared Major Evers of the 9th U. S. Infantry, now stationed at Madison Square, New York; Henry Gumming, one of the pro- prietors of the Minneapolis Tribune^ and the late Milo B. Stevens, who managed, for years, one of the two largest Pension-Claim agencies in the country; the other being that of George E. Lemon, editor of the National Tribune, at Washington. This region was the headquarters of a thoroughly appointed underground railroad during the Abolition days. At Madison still lives E. F. Ensign, one of the rescuers of Clark, the original of George Harris in "Uncle Tom's Cabin." Clark, after making his way northward from the Ohio river was befriended and secreted here at Madison, with the intention of his being kept until means could be secured for getting him into Canada. Slave agents located and seized him. While he was being taken to his hearing, the farmers and villagers managed to in- geniously regain possession of Clark, and he was hid- I20 '"^IR. F.ACLK'S U. S A. den, this time beyond all danger. After the war, Clark became quite a noted character as a lecturer. The only Home of the Women's Relief Corps in the United States is situated here in Madison. Within this handsome brick structure, sixty elderly women, who nobly gave their energies toward caring for, and cheering the men who served in the Northern bullet- department of the Civil war, are spending their last days. I do not believe you can select sixty individuals who better represent the Spartan element in American womanhood than those you see in this Home at Mad- ison. Their faces, while strikingly tender, at the same time exhibit that determination which would have en- abled them, if necessary, to seize the flag from the falling bearers and urge ahead the regiments and com- panies. The sort of character these women possess is not met with every day. Yet, we must have it, else where would our soldiers and Presidents be produced? Without such, a king might soon be located at Wash- ington, D. C. The idea of this home originated with Mrs. Annie Wittenmeyer, of Sanatoga, Pa., a lady known throughout the Union, to the Grand Army of the Republic and the Women's Relief Corps. 'Ihe W. R. C. raised the money and the home was built just five years ago. 'Ihe matron of the institution is Mrs Clare Hoyt Burleigh, a former President of the W. R. C. It is well worth while to visit this place and talk with the inmates. There are those here who were factors in scenes that were interesting. For instance, there is Mrs. Hiler, who, as a dispatch bearer, has many times ridden, on a bareback horse, through the Rebel lines. Mother Ransom, beloved of California, because of her brave mercies to the Golden State's soldiers. Another is Mrs. Shute, once a schoolmate of Harriet MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. I2i Beecher Stowe, and, although over eighty-six, she will convince you, by her familiarity with several foreign languages, of her liberal education. Here is Mrs. Randolph, a colored woman, the only one in the insti- tution. She can tell of things that will show you what the North fought about. It is a patriotic satisfaction to walk through this building, observe everywhere the effort made toward the comfort of these deserving women ; to ramble over the farm maintained in con- nection with the place, and to know that the Union has a National home for those who, though they could not carry muskets, did that which was of almost equal value, — carried comfort to the wounded and dying, and became the only angels the army boy ever knew. ON THE EDGE OF ERIE. A WIDE, smooth, level road with borders of evenly mown green turf. This was the road that skirted Lake Erie for miles and miles east of the city of Erie. We rolled leisurely along this charming drive- way, one bright afternoon late in August. It was a Saturday, and we were within about twenty miles of Buffalo. There was a cool breeze blowing lightly from the Lake and the blue, the intensely blue, expanse of its waters was usually in full view on our left, reaching northward and westward as far as the eye could reach. The extreme limit northward was a long, gray, undu- lating cloud that we suspected was a range of Canadian hills. Away to the west, the blue of the waters deep- ened until they appeared to meet the blue of the sky in a purple haze. Finely cultivated garden farms upon our right showed a mingling of almost infinite tints of greens and browns which contrasted agreeably with the blues upon our left The loftiness of the arch of sky above, the far- away horizon, and the blues upon our left, threw a pe- culiar grandeur and a lavishness of magnificence over the whole scene. We had become so accustomed to the low heavens and the near horizon of the prairies, that the present vastness of space had a wonderful fas- cination for us. MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 123 Pleasure seekers were everywhere. Gay bicyclists, alone, or in groups, flashed by. Open carriages full of young people in bright, Summer costumes, chatting and laughing, drove ra[>idly past. All this seemed in keeping with the day and the landscape, though the occasional aristocratic barouche, drawn by dock-tailed long limbed horses, imparted a touch of something that impressed us as out of harmony. As we neared Buffalo, within twelve or fourteen miles, the grassy space between the highway and the Lake began to show decided evidence of that modern improver(?), the landscape gardener. Flowers, shrubs, trained vines, and fantastically pruned evergreens bor- dered the gravelled paths that crossed and re-crossed each other at all degrees of angles. Then came the dainty cottages, and villas, so artistically constructed, and arranged amid masses of leafy green and profusion of flowers, they could hardly fail to be a delight to the passer-by, as well as to the occupants. Still farther on, costlier and much more magnificent residences came into view. The lawns surrounding these were terraced to the edge of the Lake, and on each terrace tropical plants bloomed in luxurious abundance. There were vine-covered arches where hung the shining houses of gaily feathered songsters; observation tow- ers, flower-wreathed pavilions and pagodas in which hammocks were swung. Then, two, or three, odd looking little buildings attracted our attention that re- minded us of the Javanese huts at the World's Fair. " Do you suppose those can be the genuine struc- tures.'' " I said to John. " Brought here from Chicago, as souvenirs of the Fair? " " Must be," he answered. " Just the traps to catch the eye of a millionaire. It's the oddity that takes. 124^ MR. EAGLE'S U S. A. You know what the little boy said, as he watched the monkey cage at the circus. ' 'F I had a face like a stove-cover an' eyes a mile apart, gunuls would be feedin' me candy an' callin' me a sweety-eety ting, but I haint nothin' 'cept a boy, an' it's taters 'n bread f m one year ter tother! ' " We questioned an attendant who happened to stand at the entrance to the grounds of one of these homes, and learned that our conjectures were right. There were two Javanese huts, and a third represented a pea- sant's house in old Ireland. Perchance, the rich peo- ple who purchased them had a purpose apart from their novelty in placing them so conspicuously on the front lawn. However that may be, the thoughtful could draw many a lesson from the contrast between these far-off homes and the luxurious dwellings overlooking them. No doubt, more than one owner, as he glanced at them, would think of the humble cottage where he began life's struggle. A sudden puff of wind, then a swiftly-moving shadow from the west, chasing away the golden light that lay over the earth, caused us to lean out of the phaeton and look backward. "I believe a storm is coming up," I exclaimed., as I searched the western heavens. "That purple-blue wall I noticed some time ago is almost black now, and is ever so much nearer. It is traveling after us, and pretty fast, too." " ' It blew, it snew, it friz on Christmas day, so merry they say!'" chanted John. Then "Mrs. A. S. Ames, hold the ploog, while I flatten this carriage top, or youHht boosted into the worter! " "Oh John! you are always spoiling the situation by such outlandish talk," I replied pettishly, but he said: MR EAGLE'S O. S. A. I2S "You can't pour out your soul on beautiful skinnery and gentle heifers when there's a storm coming up. Got to look out for your corpus then. Say, what kind of a reception do you suppose you'd get if it was rain- ing, and we drove into one of those swell yards? " "Well, you may be sure I should attempt it if the storm were upon us," I answered stoutly. "As a rule, people show kindness of heart when put to a test like that, whether rich or poor." "Nein! An old squire with white vest would come out and tell us if we'd saved our money, we shouldn't be shagging about like tramps. And when I told him it was no time then to argue the origin of species, he'd say the time to get out of the storm was before it came up. That's the sort of brotherly love we'd get. And ■" "But John," I interrupted, "there is something awful in that blue-black cloud and the hollow roar of the wind, and see; there come the waves tumbling over each other into long black troughs." " Lake Michigan showed a muddy green in a storm," John added. " These waters look nearer black than anything else." "Grewsome!" I interjected, gathering my wraps about me. "But do look at Kit! She don't know what to think of those tumbling waves. See how big her eyes are, how distended her nostrils! She points her ears like 'a Princess of the Desert! ' as Ben Hur would say. Oh, my!" I exclaimed, as the waves broke upon the shore and Kit gave a little jump. "This road is much too near the water." "She will soon get used to it," comforted John. " Soon as she's sure it's nothing but waves, she'll not mind it." 126 MR. EAGLE'S U. S, A. Splash, splash! Splash, splash! came the waves, dashing yeasty spray far up the steep banks and ledges. Blacker and blacker grew the northern sky. More sullen became the wind's roar. Something terrible seemed about to be upon us. I looked backward. ■|"hat horrible cloud was closing in — surrounding us. "John, I can't stand this another minute! " I burst out. " We must find a place to stop. Kit is fright- ened nearly out of her senses. See her quiver." "All right," John answered, seriously enough now, " soon's we can find a place to drive in under cover." (We had left the fine houses in our rear and there were no buildings now between the highway and the Lake). "But it looks to me," he added, peering into the west, "as if the storm is traveling to the north." I followed his gaze with anxiety. Alarmed as I was for our safety, (I was used to the sudden, rushing sweep of the winds upon the prairies, that carries everything before it), I could not help noticing the marvelous mingling of the blues and purples, relieved only by the tossing, flying, bursting, scattering ridges of foam. We had so circled around the Lake that it seemed now to be everywhere except directly on our right. The road ahead was so near the Lake, it looked as if a few rods nearer would tumble us into the water whose frightful fury was increasing every moment. There was no fence or railing between us and the Lake, and the banks were steep, but my confidence in Kit's good sense comforted me. " If she does make a sud- den lunge, it will be away from those awful waters," was my mental comment. Brave, faithful, little horse! Though there was a nervous quiver in every muscle of her body, and she hardly touched the ground, her step was so light and springy, she watched those white-caps MR. KAOLr/S U. S. A. 127 come rolling and dash themselves almost at her feet, yet she controlled herself from doing anything more harmful than giving a little jump now and then. John kept up a continued soothing talk to her, for he knew as well as I, that the instinct to give one leap and be off like a deer, was working strongly within her. We continued to drive on, watching eagerly for shelter. For some reason, this locality seemed rough- er, the farming was of ' the ordinary sort, and the houses we passed at intervals upon our right, were commonplace homes. There were barns, but they were closed, and we did not like to waste time by try- ing to hunt up their owners to ask permission to drive in, and then, perhaps, be refused. We were looking for an open shed where there could be no excuse for denying us a refuge, during the storm. As for the barns, we could besiege them as a last resort, but we were reluctant to intrude upon private homes until compelled to do so. We were well protected from rain, when not accompanied by too strong wind, and we kept hoping that, as John had suggested, the storm would spend its threatening off to the north. Our attention had been absorbed for some minutes in watching the way ahead, quieting Kit, and debating as to what was best to do, when a single bright shaft of golden light shot obliquely through the gloom, from the west, down into the middle of the Lake. It was so sudden, and so swift, it startled me. My first im- pression was that it was lightning, and I instinctively held my breath for an accompanying report. None came. Then I turned for the sun. A most curious spectacle was presented. It was as if a flaming sword had plunged through the western edge of the purple wall that still reached from water to sky, with such 128 ^^IR- EAGLE'S U. S. A. force that it buried its point in the depths of the Lake. All around was dark except for the scintillations from this tapering sword of fire. But it was only for one instant. Then another sword of flame drove down into the center of a big black-hearted billow, cutting its frosty crest into fragments that were tossed defiantly upward in gleaming si)rays of jewels. Then came other sword-thrusts in swift succession, till rainbow waves, shivered into sparkling globules, swelled, and rolled, and plunged, into what looked like a lake of flame un- derlying and glinting through the turbulent blue of Erie. While this transformation scene was being wrought upon the water, a change quite as complete, if not as unusual, was going on in the western sky. The sun had cut and slashed the wall that had held him pris- oner for more than an hour, until its side edge was cleft into fragments, that trailed after the main mass which was moving in slow majesty northward. These fragments were rimmed, and stippled, and barred, with every shade and tint into which light can be resolved. These tints rapidly spread and grew into the dark body of the wall as it receded. They pierced it as with burning needle points, which presently turned into shafts of amber, and crimson, then melted into a sheet of gold that stretched, like a curtain, back of the wall, quickly changing its purple to blue, then to violet, and at last to fleecy silver, which the wind caught and tossed lightly heavenward. The wall was a huge body of purple still, and every moment its pace northward was accelerated. It could not escape, however, the destructive plunges of the fiery lances into its western border. By degrees, its whole sombre front assumed a lighter cast, a blue, MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 129 through which presently showed, at intervals, a hint of light, then a glint, then a shimmer, and then — ! How shall I describe it ? The whole vast barrier, honey- combed with flames, burst apart, — separated into rag- ged blue fragments that hung there in space before an arching sky that bewildered the senses with its dazzling radiance as with heaps of burning opals, giving out in flames the myriad tints that had been gathering in their hearts for ages' A. S. A. ON HORSE THIEVES. TT THENEVER we stopped over night at a farm XiXl house, mother was almost certain to ask, at some time during the evening, if they kept the barn locked. If she got a reply in the negative, she'd follow up, woman like, with another question, and want to know if they never had any horses stolen. She kept Kit's welfare and safety constantly in mind. Her questions would get the old farmer reminiscent on the subject of stealing horses and many a tale did we hear after the supper things had been disposed of, and the bed-time pipe was being smoked Back at Dyer Station, in Indiana, when we first drove into that State, we discovered we were in the horse-thief's domain. Four had been stolen in this hamlet the week previous When we asked the German landlord what folks did when horses were taken, he said, " Oh veil, vat can ve do? Nodinks! Nodinks! Dat's vat ve does!" But when we reached Michigan, and while getting dinner, one noon, at White Pigeon, just over the line, I hap- pened to speak of the incidents at Dyer. "No bother now," said my host cheerily. ''You're in the State of Michigan!" Then he went on to tell of Michigan's having a " State Anti-Horse-thief Association." It seems that, for many years, the Wolverine farmers have supported the society with vigor, and since its organization, depredations have been greatly dimin- MR. EAGLE-S U. S. A. 131 ished. The State Association has officers in each county who have the appointing of "riders," and ex- ercise a general supervision over the local workings of the order. The "riders" are those whose duty it is to chase on the trail of thieves and pass word along the line. There is one for every town and hamlet. When a horse is missed, the farmer notifies the nearest "rider," and telegraphs to Headquarters. Thus, in a few hours, a score of officials will be covering every road within a hundred miles, while from both State and county offices circulars are being struck off and sent to the Chiefs of Police in all cities of the State and those bordering upon it. The system is manipulated upon a detective plan hard to excel, and compared to which the police aid from the small towns of a county is absolutely worthless. Thus it is next to impossible for a thief to successfully get away with an animal. Ohio has its Associations, and so does New York. The patrons say if they could afford no other luxury, they would not fail to keep up their membership in the Anti-Horse-thief, and it is not so very expensive either, a small per capita assessment sufficing to pay all ex- penses and keep a modest sum in the treasury. The State of Massachusetts can claim the pioneer society of this sort, the first one having been organized in Ded- ham in iSio. The skilled thief, however, will get his innings once in a while. One evening at a farm near Conneaut, the most easterly town in Ohio, the owner was showing us some splendid work-horses and stepping up to a big bay, "This fellow," he said, as he slapped the animal's heavy flank, "and his mate, there, were stole from me last Fall, but I got 'em back after going clear to Jamestown, N. Y." Of course, we were interested to 132 MR- EAGLE'S U. S. A. know about it. " Well, it was 'long about the first of September. I got up one morning and went down into the pasture here, but they want no horses to be found. Then I see where the fence had been torn down, and I knowed the rest. Well, I didn't get no word for more than a month. I've a brother up to Buffalo that's a detective, and he wrote me to get over into the neigh- borhood o' Jamestown and he thought I'd find my horses somewheres there. I hitched up and drove all the way. It was a drive too. I was gone from home six weeks. Of course I was watching and hunting as I went along. I drove through them Pennsylvany mountains and into every out o' the way place where they was resorts for hard characters. Some times, I'd be three days without strikin' a house. I lost my way lots o' times and, oh, I had a dickens of a jaunt! But I was bound to get them horses if they was in the .territory. You know how 'tis. In the early days, they used to hang horse-thieves on sight or suspicion, fer horses was a farmer's all. And 'taint so much changed now," giving the big bay a caressing pat, "fer ye know a horse is everything to a farmer. He works 'long with 'em and gits attached to 'em. Well, I haul- ed up at Jamestown after a while and they told me, first thing, they was two half-breeds drove in there a spell back and the policeman, being suspicious of 'em, sung out to 'em to stop as they was driving along the main street. For answer, the fellers jumped out an' run 'n got away. They told me the horses was so beat out 'twas no wonder the fellers trusted to their own legs. A livery stable had been keepin' the animals, 'n I went down there. I looked over the rows, more'n fifty I guess. Finally I sized up two, an' told 'em if those want mine 'twas no use. I stepped in 'tween 'em MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 133 and sung out 'Bob 'n Jerry!' Clorry! Ye ouglit ter seen 'em neighin' an' whinnyin! They wuz so poor ye could almost see their bones! " We stopped over night at the home of William K. Phillips, a prosperous farmer living at West Junius, in Seneca county, New York. He was telling of a neigh- borhood genius of some years ago. " He was the greatest feller with horses I ever saw." said Mr. Phillips. " He had been in tl^we penitentiary for horse stealing, but while he was about here, some folks seemed to look upon him as not more than half- witted. It just seemed, however, as though that feller would take any horse and handle him any way he want- ed to. It appeared as if he could actually charm 'em. He always wore an old greasy vest, and in fussing with a horse, he'd always let 'em smell of that vest. They claim he had some kind of spice, or drug, he put on that, which horses liked. Anyhow, he'd never allow that vest to be washed. I remember once of a farmer coming along the road and seein' this feller layin' in a drunken snooze, and across the road was a great stallion feedin'. Well, the farmer was nigh scared to death, for no such beast as that is safe to have loose on a country highway. He roused up this feller, Jones, and asked him if he didn't have no more sense than to leave that stallion loose. Jones says, 'Don't ye worry. Thet there horse won't go three rods away from me I ' The farmer drove on a piece, and set and watched as much as three-quarters of an hour and, sure's you live, thet critter staid right in the close vicinity of Jones. It looked sorter's if Jones was a magician. " " Here's one that is pretty tough to tell, but it's true just the same: They was a lot of fellers talking 134 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. one night at the tavern about losing horses and this Jones was hearin' the talk. One of the farmers said he'd bet fifty dollars nobody could steal his horse, and then he went on to tell that he always kept the doors locked and a big brindle bull-dog loose in the barn. Jones told 'em he could take the horse right out o' the barn any night he took a notion, and not get hurt. Well, of course, the farmer was certain he couldn't, and out with his wallet, put fifty into the landlord's hands and gave Jones the dare to go ahead. Well, 't went on for three months and folks had forgotten the bet, 'n got tired of askin' the farmer about the matter when, one mornin', sir, the horse was gone and the bulldog, too. They'd heard no noise nor anything during the night and no blood was 'round the premises. A couple days later, the farmer got a note tellin' him if he'd go to the depot, he could get his dog which had been shipped down in a crate from Auburn the day before. He went over to the station and there was his dog! Next morning, the farmer was told to be at the tavern at ten o'clock. He was there and at ten- thirty Jones come driving up in the farmer's wagon and behind the farmer's horse to get the fifty, — and he got it, too! But Jones, poor critter, is in a jail that'll keep him warm for some time. He died about four years ago. " AN IDEAL COLLEGE TOWN. DO NOT wonder that Clinton Scollard finds this town, for which he is named, an inspiration to his poetic soul, nor that Hamilton College has ground out some big men, nor that Houghton Semin- ary, hard by, is annually "finishing" handsome wives for the lusty Hamiltonians. It was the afternoon of September 12. We had been wending our way for an hour along the loveliest of tree- embowered roads, when we began to almost impercep- tibly, but gradually, descend, and suddenly, there opened upon us a view off over a town buried among the trees in the valley at the foot of the long slope while, in the distance beyond, the numerous hills were wearing a purplish hue in the rays of the afternoon sun. A quarter-mile more of descent and, on our left, at about half way down the grade, stood a most pecu- liar looking building. It was old-fashioned, large, and had been painted, at one time, a sort of dull yellow. Its solemn, bare walls, windows unrelieved by cornices or trimmings, scarred doors, and weather-beaten roof, gave the structure an appearance of having seen better days. As I sat and looked at it, this mute pile of vene- rable brick seemed to be saying valiantly to whatever barbarian might pass; "A little battered, but still eminently respectable thank you!" It was the main building of Hamilton College. 136 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. We drove on down and were soon passing rows of College " Chapter Houses." They were painted in all colors of the rainbow, and, up in their cornices, or over doors, were fixed emblems which naught but worm-eaten Mythologies and the playful deviltry of the modern undergraduate's brain could ever have united in conjuring up. The only things that I ever knew of that could approach these crests and mottoes in utter unintelligibility were, possibly, the Turkish signs that plastered the Midway Plaisance at the time of the World's Fair in Chicago. We crossed a rude bridge over a mill-swamp, and drew up in front of a hotel in the public square at Clinton, N. Y. This is primarily and exclusively a College town. What business enterprises are carried on are the result of the fact that Hamilton College, Houghton Seminary, a quondam Normal school, and I don't know what else, are located here. The place is an enrapturing haunt for the man who seeks to steep his soul in the lore of former events. Within this wooded valley, where the residences are obscured by the lazy branches of ancient trees, the babble and bustle of the busy material world cannot enter. The streets are clean, the sidewalks nicely scoured, and the tin pans and pots that set about some of the old houses are stationed in that orderly, old-maidish way that indicate they may have been put there to remain for all time. The place seemed so ciuiet that the hum of a bee would have jarred the stillness. Folks, sometimes, get a wondering why the country life originates so many Presidents, judges, railway lawyers, financiers, and such; and why the country college sends out proportionately so many more cele- brated scholars than the learning-mills in our metro- MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 137 politan centres. Clinton can reveal the reason. It is because the quiet, assuring, vigor-giving atmosphere of the trees, hills, birds, and brooks, tends to awaken real contemplation. This is a little community of scholars. The President of Hamilton knows personally every mischievous "undergrad" he meets, as he saunters statelily down town for his mail. Everybody is familiar with everybody else. Set Clinton down by the edge of a great city, with the Anna Helds and Yvette Guilberts to come trooping in at regular intervals, and where would her refined college influence be ? No, — men aren't dragged away here to exciting scenes. The wildest Freshman can not be in Clinton long be- fore he feels almost unconsciously a dignity and inter- est in the student life that he never thought it possible for him to possess. Did Samuel Kirkland think of these things when he was doing missionary work here with the Oneida Indians, in the eighteenth Century? when, in 1793, he established Hamilton Oneida Acad- emy? It was an important event when this institution was set up in what was then " the western wilderness." General Washington was interested in the enterprise, and Baron Steuben, with a troop of Continentals, came here and marched up the hill to lay the corner stone of the new Academy. By 181 1, the school had become of so much consequence that a college was talked of and, in 181 2, Hamilton Oneida Academy became Hamilton College, named in honor of the victim of Weehawken. So Hamilton, in the list of American colleges, stands twenty-eighth in point of seniority, antedating the University of the City of New York by nineteen years, Lafayette by thirteen, and Trinity by eleven. Since its establishment, some men of great brain-thew have been graduated here: Gerrit Smith, of 138 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. Anti-Slavery fame; Asahel C. Kendrick, the Greek scholar; Herrick Johnson, the Chicago divine; Charles Dudley Warner; Ormsby M. Mitchell, the astronomer; Lyman Abbott; Elihu Root, the New York lawyer; W. H. H. Miller, ex-President Harrison's Attorney General; John Dean Caton, lately deceased, of the Su- preme Court of Illinois; Theodore Dwight;'John Jay Knox; Clinton Scollard, the poet; and Elliot Anthony, the Chicago jurist; are among the number. Some time ago, the trustees decided to get new life into the institution. They went out to Chicago and fetched back Melancthon Woolsey Stryker, L. H. D., D. D., L. L. D. ; and he is just as good a man as his name and titles. Dr. Stryker was inaugurated, January 17, 1893, and since his advent, many progressive measures have been put in force. He declared, at the outset: "I venture to insist that our foremost duty is to secure to the chairs already existing an income which shall be more respectable recognition of the labors of their occupants. $1500 has, hitherto, been the pay of our full professors." Think of it! A man begins a professorship here at, say thirty, or forty. He has spent four years cram- ming his caput in the American college, and perhaps three more in a European University. He has used every cent he could earn by tutoring, taught in Summer schools during vacations, and his parents, if he had any, have nigh bankrupted themselves in supplying funds. With a feeble constitution, weak and bespec- tacled eyes, and a great, twelve-bastioned brain, he comes to Clinton, bids a complete farewell to the world, goes up on the hill to the College and works like a Spartan for a salary of about half what a soap drummer receives! I honor Dr. Stryker for his position in this MU F.AfU.E'S U. S. A. 139 matter of salaries, and he has already brought about some reforms. Houghton Seminary is a rookery-like sort of a place, romantically conceded within an inclosure of sombre birches, oaks, and pines that do not gossip, and no lovelier spot could be created for the collegian to tryst with his slim-waisted, fawn-eyed Seminary maiden. For all practical purposes in this line, it is admirably adapted. The institution has been in existence since '61, and the daughters of some of the best families of the State have been mentally and matrimonially devel- oped here. Ex-President Cleveland has had to serve as a friend and advertiser for so many educational foundries that it seems almost a strain on patience to drag him in here, but I have to do it. Rose Elizabeth Cleveland, his literary sister, lifted Houghton from the plane of obscurity by graduating here in 1886. A niece (whoever she may be), also attended Houghton. The pagan will thrive and fatten in the very midst of all spiritual and aesthetic surroundings. A couple of college fellows who were spending the Summer in Clinton were playing ball in the square. A town boy came along and soon managed to take part. He got one of the students to put on the catching gloves, and the way he socked the " in-shoots " and "drops" at him was a caution. After a while, the town boy got heated and sat himself under a tree to cool off. As he mopped his face with his shirt sleeve, he chanced to see a book beside him. It belonged to one of the col- legians. He picked it up and casually turned a leaf or two, then, looked at the back, and saw but one word he could read. Turning the book over and over in his grimy hand, he finally exclaimed, in the most disgust- ed tones, "Virgil! Virgil! Whether is Virgil?" THE MEANEST MAN. ON September 7th we took one of our longest and hardest drives. The road was rough and hilly. We counted on finding a hotel at East Winfield, N. Y. About an hour before we reached there, a cold, drizzling rain set in, accompanied by a thick fog. Night began to settle down when we drew up to the first house of a little hamlet of a dozen or so, nice-looking country homes, and enquired of a man who was attend- ing to his chores, for a hotel. "They aint no hotel here," he said. " No hotel ! " I repeated in dismay, -'and we can't see a rod ahead of us ! What shall we do? " " There's one two miles west," the man in the barn- yard added. " But there are railroad crossings, and we would drive right on to the tracks without knowing it, in this fog," I said in a low voice to John. I thought hard for a minute, then I exclaimed with determination: "John, here are more than a dozen homes of well-to-do people, and I know some of these folks will take us in over night. They will not refuse a middle-aged woman like me. In all the journey we have travelled, we have not had serious difficulty in in- ducing some private family to keep us over night, and here we are with twelve households to apply to." " I wonder if we couldn't get put up at one of these places here! " called John to the man in the yard. MR. "EAGLE'S U. S. A. I4I "Wall,— I kinder think ye'd better try 'n find a tav- ern 'fore it gits plum dark. When it gits dark it'll be dark," drawled the man. " It's almost as dark as it can be now," I whispered to John. "And that railroad over there must run close to the carraige road all the way to West Winfield. Kit would never bear a train running so close! We know that. I am going to stay at one of these houses. I am tired half to death, and as hungry as I can be," I declared, throwing aside the rubber lap-robe and mak- ing ready to alight. " You stay here, and I'll see what I can do " (stepping out). "All right," sighed John, resignedly. "You will have your way, but I don't believe you will succeed." The first two places I called at, the ladies said their husbands were ill, and they seemed quite polite in ex- cusing themselves. Then I went to a long story-and- a-half house, having several large red barns and other out-buildings in the rear. I walked up to the side door and rang the bell. A man of about fifty, I should judge, opened the door. I explained briefly our situa- tion and, offering to pay any price he might ask, lite- rally begged a shelter for the night, — merely a shelter — would not ask for food, or stable for our horse — we would find that elsewhere; a lounge, cot, or, I would rest on the floor if only we could be sheltered from the rain, fog, and the darkness without. A lady, evidently the man's wife, sat in a rocker near the door at the right. It was apparently their family sitting-room She seemed interested, and I was sure she was willing to accommodate us, but the man demurred without vouchsafing any special excuse. " I am very sorry to trouble you," I added depreca- tingly, " but — " 142 MR. EAGLE-S U. S. A "Well, — it would be a trouble," he interrupted with such sharp decisiveness that with a " Beg your pardon. Good evening," I turned and went down the walk. Even then, I could not believe that it was reserved for a hamlet in eastern New York to be the first on our trip from Illinois to refuse us one night's lodging. "Some one in all these comfortable homes has heart enough to be willing to put himself out that much through sympathy for a woman of my age," I still in- sisted, as I reported to John my last failure. " I tell you, mother, you are wasting your time on sentiment," John urged. "There are plenty of peo- ple who don't care a rap who is out in the storm, so long's they're comfortably housed. These folks are of that kind, I know by the way that man back here in the barnyard answered. It's getting dark as pitch. Do get in here and let's go on." " No, I won't give up yet," and I started toward an- other house. Failing at this, I tried another, and an- other, and another, till there was not one more to assail, then, crestfallen and heart-sick, I went back to where John and Kit were impatiently waiting. Kit greeted me with a joyful neigh, for she thought I was surely come to take her to a stable. She had learned, long since, that these halts at night-fall meant both hay and oats. So confident was she that her day's work was done, she tried to turn into a barnyard. It went sorely against me to have to force her on two or three miles further. "Are you satisfied now about these people?" John questioned, when I was once more seated in the phae- ton. "Yes, lam, I answered firmly. "But, oh John, just think how terrible it would be to be cast among MR. EAGLE'S U, S. A. 143 such people with no money ! I really do not believe they would care the slightest if we were run over by a train, nor what becomes of us. It is my first experi- ence with such a community, and my confidence in human sympathy has had a tumble, — but, John, how dark it is! I can hardly see Kit. This is dangerous. " " Here, you take the lines. I am going to get out and walk ahead. Then I can hear a train before it gets very near, so you needn't worry about that." John disappeared in the mist, and I had to trust to Kit to keep the way, for I could not see, however hard J strained my eyes. But I knew John was near and on guard, although I could neither see nor hear him. What a comfort that was ! In this manner, we groped through the fog, the rain, and darkness to West Winfield, where we saw the wel- come light shining through the windows of the Trav- eler's Home. " Heaven bless the wanderer's home, the Hotel ! " I inwardly exclaimed, as I handed the lines to an hostler and alighted. Later, I mentioned to the landlady the unfeeling re- buff I had received from that middle aged man back in East Winfield. "What sort of looking man was he? " she asked. I described him and his home briefly. She laughed. "No wonder you thought he was heartless," she said. "He's a noted character all around here. A year ago, a neighbor woman was driving by his house, when his dog came out and Jumped at her horse. The animal was scared, whirled, and upset the carriage. The lady was thrown out and had her hip dislocated. A couple of men happened to drive along just then, ;;iul saw the woman lying beside the road, too stunned 144 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. to even call for help. It was in the edge of evening, and they went to old Crope's house to get a lan- tern. Well, if you'll believe it, that man would not even loan the lantern so's they could take care of that woman ! The woman sued him for ten thousand dollars damages. The lantern story was told in the trial, and the verdict was against him. He appealed to the Supreme Court, and I believe it hasn't been settled yet. And that makes me think. A few days ago, they had a church social at old Crope's, and the neighbors did enjoy going in and muddying up his carpets! They said he looked all the evening as if 'twas wringing his very heart-strings to have to furnish all that cake and stuff to the neighbors! " A. S. A. RICHFIELD SPRINGS. THE Summer-resort guide book, and the Summer- resort gossip in the metropolitan papers — and the reality ! "Well, where is the gorgeousness? " we were asking as we drove into Richfield Springs, by the western ap- proach to the main street. We could see nothing re- markably different from the many other towns we had passed through in this section of eastern New York. On our left was an old tavern whose weather-beaten sign bore the words: "Richfield House." We turned into the yard and put up our horse. The Richfield House had once served as the sole inn of the vicinity, — at the time when Richfield Springs was just an ordi- nary hamlet in every way, — but when, about 3870, modern bonifaces descended upon the place, erected Summer hotels, and began to buy up columns in New York papers, this establishment was relegated to dis- use. It serves now chiefly as a connecting link be- tween the old and the new Richfield. While waiting dinner in the front room, the " bar " of past days, we noticed a yellowed parchment hanging, on the wall. Upon inspection it proved to be a deed, made in 1731, conveying, "in the Province of New York, a parcel of land," on which the present village is located. It was a curious, old document, setting forth, in the Old English hand, with all the words the acute convey- 146 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. ancer could conjure, the "metes and bounds." A fierce-looking woman presently came in and announced in a loud, stingy voice: "Meal's ready!" We walked out into the low-ceilinged dining-room. There we found about twenty others. From the talk, I judged them to be musicians at the large hotels, or clerks in local shops. The fierce woman strode around among the guests, and set the dishes down with a crash, as if she were feeding a gang of convicts. During the eating, one fellow had the temerity to ask for another potato. "Aint none! " she declared, in a tone sugges- tive of war if he pressed the matter. My tea presently gave out, but I glanced at that Amazon, and she looked so sanguinary, she was almost six feet high, that I thought it best to go without tea rather than suffer danger of extermination. After dinner, I set out for a little jaunt about the town. In perhaps a three minutes' walk straight down the street, I was suddenly looking upon the Richfield Springs of today. It seemed as if I had dropped from a staid, sleepy, pastoral domain, into a fairy gar- garden of plashing fountains, gay flowers and splen- didly kept lawns. On either side of the street were parks surrounding a dozen huge, frame hotels. These were painted in gaudy colors, from an evident effort to create a blaring impression of enormous prosperity and liveliness. They were placed back from the street so far, that, viewing the town from the west, as we had done, nothing whatever could be seen of this dash- ing, smashing array. The buildings and grounds were certainly not so located as to advertise the spot in any practical or harmonious sense, for they were huddled together, as I say, far back from the street. Two blocks comprised the entirety of "Richfield Springs," MK EAGI.F/S U. S. A. 147 which is situated in the northern edge of Otsego county, 100 miles due west of Albany. Architecturally, there is nothing about the hotels that is attractive. Great, long, three, and four, story structures they look like a species of warehouse. To my left was the American. Opposite were the Earlington, and the Kendallwood, each accommodating about three hun- dred. Beyond the American, on the same side of the street, was the Spring House, which was the largest of all the hotels, and the pioneer as well, the principal "springs" being upon its grounds. The parks were filled with rustic settees and benches. It is here that the guests stroll about, and lounge, after they have taken their course of treatment at the springs' bathing apartments. The cures effected by these waters are said to be really remarkable, and it is claimed that there is more sulphurated hydrogen in them than in any others in the United States. Richfield, as a "re- sort," has an immense vogue, and, in the season, from three to five thousand people are here. A glance at the hotel registers will show some of the best known names in the country, as regards people of society. Indeed, the place ranks next to Saratoga in fashionable consequence. Were it not, however, for the drives that are af- forded, the boarder at Richfield would perish of cnnui^ for there is certainly little that is picturesque, or novel, in the location of the town, set down, as it is, in a sort of bowl-like depression in what was manifestly, not so many pears ago, a region af scrub pines and swamp. Candarago Lake, near the town, is an insignificant bit of water, and very like a mill pond. If one will jump on a coach though, and ride off eastward toward Cherry Valley, the scenes of the Indian massacres of t4S MR. EAGLE'S U. S A. 1777, he will soon come to hills affording delightful views. Southeastward is Cooperstuwn, at the head of Otsego Lake, which latter is beautiful in the truest sense. This locality was the home of the novelist, James Fenimore Cooper, and the lake is the " Glimmerglass" of his " Deerslayer. " The whole country.about is rich in reminders of the once popular litterateur. A move- ment is in progress for the restoration and preservation of the private estate owned by him. The property comprised about five acres, and the project is to put this, as nearly as possible, in its condition at the time the owner was alive. The place will still be owned, as it is now, by the descendants, but will be open to the public. The only member of tlie family, however, who bears the family name, is Miss Richard Cooper, the daughter of the novelist, and she is nearly eighty. Probably one reason why this effort to memorialize the Cooper estate, has been so long of evolution is due, in a measure, to the personality of James Fenimore Cooper. He lived like a recluse, was forbidding to his neighbors, and made himself, in their eyes, a being to be looked upon with the awe that might have characterized the worship of Jove. There was none of the kindly pres- ence of Longfellow or Holmes It is no wonder that the townspeople have never been very enthusiastic in referring to him. Old men, crippled from various rheumatic and di- gestive disorders, were hobbling about. Middle-aged men with silk hats peranibuk^ted the walks. These, together with children and whole armies of young women, composed the Richfield Springs colony as I saw it, while standing on the steps of the Spring House. But the young men. Where, oh where were they? MR EAGLE'S O. S. A. 149 There you could see the young ladies, sitting disconso- lately on the verandas, and hooking off aimlessly and vacantly over the street. Others were majestically promenading back and forth, or, huddled away in cor- ners, were listlessly turning the pages of novels. A few, mostly of thoroughly matured years, were cro- cheting. My attention was presently drawn to a couple on a not-far-away settee. One was a slender brunette, handsome of face, with a picture hat, and stunning green gown. She was gotten up in the very latest Pa- risian e.xquisiteness. Her companion was excessively fetching in a pink costume. All the expense that they could conceive of was evidenced in their whole make- up, even to their sun-shades ane daintily moulded pat- ent leather boots. Their conversation ran thus: She of the green (looking wearily about and rapping her toe against her sunshade): "Oh dear! " She of the pink (puttidg her be ringed hand to her cheek and sighing) : " My I " " I don't know what t() do! " " Isn't it awful? " (digging her sun-shade into the floor.) " I wish papa would take me to some other place." " Going to wear your new Felix at the hop tonight?" "Yes" (wearily), " oh, I wish there 'd be some men there. " " I wish Jack were here ! " " /sfi' ^ it awful ! " "Awful!" "What lovely lace that is! " " I think it's pretty." " Very!" (Yawning) "Oh dear!" " Mercy ! " 15° MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. "I'm bored to death ! " " Nothing but grandpas and infants! " (With gusto) "Wouldn't it be good to see a real live man? " " I should think so!" "Oh, there's a sweet costume!" " Her hat is too small." "Think so!" "Oh dear! " "Oh dear!" And so on, ad perpetuitatem ad nauseam. I asked the hotel clerk's opinion of the drought of young men. It was this: " Oceans of these society bucks aint got the scads, and those that have, say taint swift enough here!" Toward the middle of the afternoon, when we had left Richfield Springs, and were on our way eastward toward Cherry Valley, as we were descending a long hill, we heard the rattle of wheels behind us. We looked around and beheld an expensive carriage drawn by a pair of big bays. We turned aside a bit that this imposing spectacle might have full swing. As it passed, we noticed the clanking pole chains, the silver- mounted harness, the crest on the brougham, and that seated therein were a couple of middle-aged dow- agers, one wearing purple silk, the other black. It was exceedingly hot, but there on the box was the coach- man in a high hat and blue, brass-buttoned coat. The Obit fit was exactly as it would have been if seen on Fifth Avenue. The sun blazed down on the coachman's un- protected eyes; his coat, fastened tightly, was suffo- cating him; perspiration stood on his cheeks, it had melted his high collar, but his lips were set with forti- tude. Here, among rocky fields, tumble-down farm- MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 151 houses, and simple, rural poverty, this city manifesta- tion seemed to constitute an insult to the inhabitants. As we went along I thought of how those pudgy females had sat as they passed us, not lazily thrown back, but stiffly and uncomfortably upright, as if, with bated breath, a world beheld them. I recalled the classification some iconoclast once made with regard to certain denizens of Uncle Sam's domain; Five stages constitute American royalty, viz: First generation : The leathery peasant toiling in European fields. Second generation: The son, in America, is :he am- bitious fortune maker. Third generation: The college graduate. Fourth generation: The Willy boy. Fifth generation: Paresis and Bloomingdale. THE PROMISED LAND. SEPTEMBER 15th was a day so perfect there was nothing left to wish for. (In addition, it was John's birthday). Everything was washed spic and span clean by the rain of the night before. The very sky seemed to have had a fresh scrubbing, it was so clear and bright. There was an elixir in the air that set every nerve tingling with delight, and made the climbing of the long, the very long hill over which our rdute lay, a pleasure continuous instead of a tedious task. Up and up we went, but we were in no hurry, and Kit was such a fast walker that we made good progress. She did not mind climbing hills, so long as we allowed her to take her own time and gait. She took a steady, even pull, except when she reached a sharp pitch, then her ambition would be fired, and she would dig her toes into the stony road bed, and go with a vim that made the veins stand out on her legs like cords. Faster and faster would she, as John called it, "scrabble," until she reached the summit. Then she would stop and look around at us for some sign of approval, saying in language as plain to us as human speech, "Havn't I done well ? " We usually carried a little store of apples that we picked up by the road side, and these we gave her as rewards for any- thing especially hard that she was required to do; and this happened very frequently since we entered the hilly State of New York. MR. EAGLE'S U. S , A. 153 Nearly all the forenoon, we had plodded upward, catching, every now and then, views of charming bits of landscape, but we had no idea of what lay ahead of us. Sections of forest groves and orchards bordering the road-way obstructed our look-out much of the time. We were not even aware that we were nearing the end of the long ascent until, after an exceptionally steep climb, we rounded a curve shaded by trees on either side, and suddenly found ourselves in an open space — "Oh-o-h I " I Cried under my breath, "Whoever saw anything like that ! " A mighty door seemed to have been flung aside for us, disclosing a new world — reaching east and west — to where the sky shuts down ; to the north, where peaks of blue melt into clouds of gray ; to the south, I forgot to look. " Jee — rusha ! " exclaimed John, "this is sassy, surely ! But where is the river ? Oh yes, I see, it is hidden away down there among the trees." "Well, I can think of nothing, nothing but that ex- pression, 'flowing with rnilk and honey. ' What a spec- tacle ! Isn't it glorious ! That great range of hills, and the distant mountains! Oh, it is beautiful ! Beau- tiful ! " "Well — the half has not been told about the Mo- Hawk valley, but," he exclaimed in the next breath, "what do you think about some dinner? Here's a hotel. You didn't see that did you ? F m hungry. Gracious, but 'twould be cheap, keeping you among the mountains. You'd forget to eat ! " "Well, if you don't let me alone now for a minute, I'll torment you good when you want to stop and ad- mire those lake scenes. You rave over those just as much as I do over the mountains; just as much." 154 MR. EAGLE'S U. S A. A solitary frame house, two stories, white, with green blinds, a door in the middle of the side facing the highway on the south, a one-story ell on the east. This was the "Prospect House." Here we stopped for dinner. There was no other dwelling in sight along the road, and all things sloped away from it in such a fashion that it impressed me as being placed on the topmost pinnacle of the world. After a quiet dinner by ourselves, John and I were led the way by our kindly host out on to the back pi- azza. "Here's a view that takes with most everybody who has any eye f(M- beauty," he remarked, as we stood spell-bound before the remarkable scene. "I've lived here now these ten year," he went on, ' and all I want is to die here. I haint got no health any more. I give up a year back. Rheumatiz has broke me all up. This place used ter be full to runnin' over every sum- mer, but this season I had ter deny takin' anybody. Lots o' folks drive over every day or so, from Richfield and Sharon Springs. Most on 'em think there's no place like it." The first bewildering surprise being past, we seated ourselves in some blue painted chairs and studied the scene at our leisure. Down the long, easy slope northward our eyes trav- eled to where the lazy Mohawk was stealing along be- tween buttressed banks, guarded by tall trees, about three miles distant. Only now and then did it betray its course in bits of glinting silver that might have been taken for little pools or creeks. So stealthy were its windings that it reminded us of the old-time wily possessors of this lovely valley. No wonder they had fought to keep it as for their lives, and that almost MR. EAGIK'S U S A. ^55 every rood of its territory marked some especially dar- ing- or cruel deed. It was easy to glance backward a hundred years and see them skulking in ambush, singly or in groups, to pick off our struggling forefathers. Scenes like this make us feel something of a thankful- nessfor the heritage that the colonists have left us. All along the valley, east and west, as far as we could see, there were faims outlined like checker boards. Their square fields of many shaded trees, green, and russet, and brown, dotted with patches of cardinal (the stubble of the buckwheat), showing viv- idly in the clear atmosphere. To the north, these farms tilled up the broad, gentle ascent, to the foot- hills of the Adirondacks some thirty miles. Beyond their tall peaks of hazy blue, struggled a broken, rug- ged line of gray that our host claimed was the Green Mountains of Vermont, about fifty miles distant. This was a long stretch for the naked eye to traverse, but, by straining our gaze to the utmost, we could occa- sionally make out distinct mountain shapes for a mo- ment, then our transient strength of vision would fail, and we could see only the cloudlike gray that circled and reached into the northern sky as if a part of it. This day and this scene stand forth in my experience alone. Newness and vastness are the dominant influ- ences, but it is the newness of beauty and the vastness of beauty. Beauty fills the world and has just been cieated. A jubilant sense of its presence steals into our souls through every avenue, making us one with it as we gaze. The sky, vaulted to such a marvellous height above us, lends itself to this unparalleled illusion of vastness. It is not a vastness, however, that in- duces awe, but, on the contrary, carries a sweeping gladness that makes one delighted to be alive — just 156 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. to be alive. Nothing looks small, common, or old. Even the Adirondacks that are silhouetted against that cloud of gray look as if they might have grown out of that dark mist that hovers about their feet. What a spot to dream away life in ! From here, it is but half a step to the infinite. One can reach and grasp the I'^.ternal Hand. Every breath wafts a prayer — a prayer f)( love, and joy — or a song of praise. Not only is it a delight to live, simply to live, bnt it must be a delight to die — which is only a step over that border line of gray into the alluring blue beyond. —A. S. A. AMONG THE HOP PICKERS. THE counties of Cayuga, Onondaga, Cortland, Madison, Chenago, Otsego and Schoharie, State of New York, comprise the hop region. More of these strong-scented herbs are grown here than in any other section this side of the Pacific coast. Harvesting begins late in August, and lasts for six weeks or more. ' Though the work of picking hops is one of the most tedious occupations that could be devised, many lively girls and boys welcome the open- ing of the season with great joy. Hop picking is con- sidered one grand, prolonged picnic. From Rochester, Geneva, Auburn, Syracuse, Rome, Troy, Cohoes, Al- bany, and many other towns, come scores of merry young people, to spend a month in the country among the vines. The labor is paid by the piece, and so wearisome, that a slow picker will not make over forty cents a day, yet, it matters little to the majority. The so- cial features make up for small wages. In a field of less than an acre, probably fifty pickers will be at work, and from sun-up to sun-down, the air vibrates with the wagging of tongues, song, or laughter. In the even ing comes the dance. Sometimes it takes place in the barn, often at the nearest tavern. There is always some genius who can saw on a fiddle, and this poor mortal is kept busy. Formalities are dispensed with. The idea is: get acquainted and have a good time. 158 MR EAGLfS U S. A. The dance starts about 8.30 and by 12 is usually at an end. The measures are of a most primitive descrip- tion. The good old "square" dance is the favorite, and is gone through over and over. The waltz and schottische do not find much favor. What your hop picker likes are: "Whirl your lady once around, " and "Join yer pardner in 'er railroad swing. " When the last tune is emitted from the rheumatic violin, comes the time for the walk home, over the moonlit roads. Many a romance that ends at the altar has its beginning in this tramp across the hills and hollows. We had the honor of attending one of these dances. The evening of September 15, we stopped for the night at a cross-roads tavern in upper Schoharie coun- ty. This tavern, a church, and three dwellings com- prised the muncipality of Carlisle. During the even- ing we noticed that the upper rooms were being lighted, and that everybody seemed to be scurrying around as if some unusual event were to take place. Then the landlady came up and told mother that they were goi g to have a dance, and said she hoped it would not disturb us. "A dance disturb us ? " I exclaimed, 'Well, I guess not ! Bring on the clans." The wagons soon began to roll up to the door, and troops of young folks to tumble up stairs. Most of them were bright, rosy-cheeked, and of ages rang- ing from eighteen to twenty-six. Three fellows in rusty black presently arrived, and made directly for the dancing hall. Each solemnly parted the tails of his Prince Albert, sat down, and with a professional glance over the hall, began to unwrap his instru- ment. A violin, a bass viol, and battered cornet con- stituted the orchestra. The leader pulled his bow across his violin, and tore MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 159 off a trial screech of weird, unearthly pitch. The girls flung off their hats and rushed pell-mell into the hall, which, by the way, was a large, low-ceilinged apartment that had been constructed at the time the tavern was built, in 18 1 2, and was designed for this exclusive pur- pose. The floor manager , a little whiffet of perhaps thirty-five, was flying about as chipper as a bantam. He was resplendent in white tie, paper collar, and black 'cut-a-vvay," and determined, as he phrased it, to see that things "went all right." He took a last grand survey of the house, jumped upon the little plat- form at the end of the room, and yelled, "Git yer pardners ! " Out the couples sprang to the middle of the floor, down hustled the little man, and in a trice had collected five cents from each wight, and skipped back to his perch. "Letter go," he bawled, and op- erations began, to the honored "Campbells are Com- ing." The crowd was soon perspiring freely. The boys went in as if at a wrestling match. The girls responded with equal ardor, and the way their skirts flew was equal to the gyrations of a team of quadrille dancers at an extravaganza. "Forward to the center, and cross right hands!" "Chassez all ! " and "Gran' right 'n left ! " followed bewilderingly. They were called by a one-eyed, freckled youth, who, with a gen- erously compact wad of "chewin" in his right cheek, stood proudly forth, satisfied that there was one occa- sion when he could be "ther hull thing." The tune suddenly changed. What its exact title was, if it ever had any title, I do not know, but the instant I heard it my thoughts reverted to scenes that used to take place at regular periods, out in far-away Illinois. There was a "fiddler and caller" from off the Lacon "bottoms" who was a lover, yea, a downright worshiper of this l6o MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. identical -'tune. " He would play it hour after hour, and he had the habit of "calling" in verses. As near as I can recollect them, they ran something like this • " S'lute yer ladies all tergether, Ladies opposite the same ; Hit ther lumber with yer leather ! Balance all an' swing yer dame. Bunch ther ladies in ther middle ! Circle lads an' do-se-do — Pay attention to ther fiddle ! Swing her 'roun' an' off we go ! First four forward ! Back to places ! Second feller ! Shuffle back ! Now you've got it down to cases! Swing 'em 'till their trotters crack! Gents all right a heel an' toein ! Swing 'em ; kiss 'em ef you kin ! On to nex', an' keep a goin' 'Till yo hit your pards agin! Gents to center ; ladies 'round 'em. Form a basket; balance all ! Whirl yer gals to where yer found 'em! Promenade around ther hall! Balance to yer pards an' trot 'em 'Round the circle double quick ! Grab an' kiss 'em while you've got 'em! Hold 'em to it if they kick! Ladies' lef hand to yer sonnies ! Alaman! Gran' right an' left ! Balance all an' swing yer honnies, Pick 'em up an' feel their heft ! MR. EAGLE-S U S. A. l6i Promenade like skeery cattle! Balance all, an' swing yer sweets ! Shake yer spurs an' make 'em rattle! Keno ! Promenade ter seats." The rear of the hall began to gradually fill with the proper array of "dead tough mugs," who, too awkward to do any cavorting, and too thirsty to keep it up if they could, hung to the benches near the door, so that they could readily hustle down stairs as occasion re- quired. The floor manager presently came forward to where some of Ihese fellows were talking and exclaimed with authority, "Gentlemen, keep quiet ! Keep quiet!" One chap told him to "go to — ! " but the manager wasn't ruffled. I learned later that he was quite a "scrapper." He told me he "had always been able to take care of himself in a mix-up. Yes, you're dod darned right I know how to run this thing," he proudly con- cluded. "Its five cents a corner, 'n all got to ante afore they gits ter dance. I wont hev no ungentlemanly conduck. I cal'late ter conduck this think right. Say, git a pardner 'n come in." I took his advice, and dur- ing the next intermission I besought me a "pardner." All the pretty girls were, of course, "engaged" for the entire evening to the same swain. It was a case of "Johnny wasn't in it for a single minute ! " and I had to content myself with a sylph whose claylike counte- nance, marked by a pug nose, liberal mouth and shiv- erish eyes betokened the ould dart I threw on my most "society" air, ran my fingers through my hair to give it the proper "roach," and sat down beside my enchantress. I was saying that I was "from Buffalo," when the prompter called, "All ready!" and we were off. In trying to tell me her name, she had got as j62 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. far as "Mary," — when "Salute your pardners ! "cut the rest of the announcement. I had'nt learned her title yet, for mind you, introductions were not re- quired in this grand ball. If you had sufficient self- assertion, you could get a companion without that for- mality. She had come to the first letter of what I imagined was intended to be her "last name," when "Swing yer pardners !" sounded, and she grabbed me as a drowning sailor does a spar, and whirled me until I saw stars. In getting breath, she panted, "Mary Moon." This somewhat astronomical information helped to break the ice. I soon learned that "Mary" "come from Syracuse," and that prior to the "hop sea- son," she had served with a family of that city as pie molder. "Like hop picking?"! asked. "Bet che! lots of fun I " she answered with gusto. "Missed haf yer life 'f yer aint never picked hops ! " She tucked her gum into a remote corner of her mouth. "Why, its a holy picnic ! We just don't do nothin' much, 'cept dance 'n carry on. An' say I We put weeds 'n things in among the hops. It helps to fill up ! But Lord: we don't pretend to earn wages ! I bet I aint earned a cent above a dollar this whole week. Its fun dancin,' though ! Lots o' fellers 'n dancin' ! That suits my style ! " Fast and furious, the swinging and the whirling went on until twelve o'clock. Then the musicians began to prepare for departure. While they were crowding out, a couple of "dead tough mugs" got into an argument at the head of the stairs. One gave the other a push, sending him in a tumbled heap clear to the bottom. The girls began to scream and things looked interest- ing, but companions hustled away him-of-the fall-down, and though the fight talk was loud and long, nothing MK. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 163 came of it. By 1 2. 30, the tavern was quiet as the grave. While the hop crop of the past year was not nearly so large as that of the preceding, possibly not more than a third as much, poor prices prevailed. In some lo- calities, the farmers said it hardly paid for harvesting. Perhaps the average for the counties mentioned at the introduction might have been from 2,500 to 3,000 bales. The principal reason for the low prices ap- peared to be in the large crop of the '9S-'96 stock that brewers had on hand, together with the fact of a plen- tiful yield in Germany and England. In many towns, hops had been selling as low as six cents a pound. This rate scarce covered the expense of hauling the bales to market. It is safe to say that next year will find many a hop field turned into a corn, or rye patch. It is commonly supposed that hop culture mainly consists in setting out a few plants, and placing poles for the vines to creep on. The notion is wide of the truth. Farmers declare there is no crop that is grown calling for more hard labor. From the time the field is started, until it is ready to yield, the second year, there must be hoeing and digging, trimming and tend- ing. There is, too, a glorious uncertainty in the en- terprise. The crop may be about ready for the har- vest, and then a few days of rain will cause the ruina- tion of the entire field. Lice are a torment, and often do the vines have to be sprayed with all the care a hot- house keeper gives his rose bushes. When picking begins interest is aroused among the poor of evey cross-roads and small city near the hop country. Every member of such homes, from the pa- rents to the six-year-old, goes to the fields For the thrifty "the season" is the source of a pretty bounty. Many a family will make its winter's supply of wood, 164 MR EAGLE'S USA. clothing and flour out of the hop revenue. But to do this means steady, patient work, and much economy. Time must not be frittered away in gabble and non- sense, for although farmers asserted they could not afford even the wages they were paying, those most pickers were making, were certainly meagre indeed. From the method used in harvesting, it can be readily seen where the attractive phase of the work looms up. Large crates are built; the dimensions being, say, four feet in length by twenty-six inches high, and twenty-six in width. The crate is divided into four equal compartments. H indies are fastened to the ends so that the apparatus can be readily moved about. A folding awning is arranged over the crate at a height of, perhaps, three feet. This is for the pro- tection of the pickers from the sun. ^ Four persons sit about each crate, and each picks into a separate com- partment. Among the young folks, you will always find a couple of girls on one side, and a brace of boys on the other. The old ladies divide off into congenial quartets, and neighborhood scandals receive a thorough attention. When a picker has filled a compartment, which holds ten bushels, he is entitled to thirty-five cents. The employer hands out a ticket. When the crop is all gathered, the cash is paid in according to the little white slips each worker presents. Now, to pick ten bushels of hops in a forenoon requires lively exercise of the fingers. Many a picker will accomplish no more than this in an entire day. The particularly rapid and attentive workers may succeed in gathering thirty-five bushels. However, the young people who are in the fields solely for sport, get a little pin money, and are well satisfied. The maids will have enough for new hats, and their gallants for cravats. MR. EAGLF'S TJ. S. A. 165 After the picking comes the drying and the pressing into bales. Every farm has its hop kiln in a building constructed especially for the purpose. The hops are spread upon a network of wire, and heat up to about 180° F. turned on. While the hops are drying, the fumes of sulphur, or brimstone, are admitted to aid in "bleaching. It requires several days to properly "cure" the herbs. When the product is finished, it is put into the presser and, in the form of bales, is ready for the market. In some sections, the farmers have tried to meet the brewers' trust with one of their own, hoping thus to -ie- cure fair prices. The agricultural combination did ot amount to a great deal, for the buyers could easily 'ind so many who where compelled to sell for almost any price, that they were perfectly independent of the undertaking. As a rule the crop was disposed of to whatever agent happened along, for hops constitute a commodity that can not well be kept over from year to year, as the aroma becomes greatly detcri')rated. TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS. ^ TTOW will we ever get through Schenectady?" I I Mother. was studying this problem for three or four days ])cfore we n-ached the place, and when, on the evening of September 17th, we drove for a mile, or so, along side of the tracks of the Delaware c*v: Hudson Canal R. R. , and stopped for the night at a little switch station about three miles south of Sche- nectady, 1 do not believe she slept very soundly. She had worked herself up to a pitch of extreme nervous- ness, for Schenectady is nothing if not a manufacturing town, and how she were to ride behind Kit among the locomotive and electrical works was, to her, a weighty question. It rained all the forenoon of the next day, and she did not fail to seize every minute of that time for worrying and inquiring "the best way to get through Schenectady. " The outcome of it was that she had such an overwhelming supply of information about "streets" and "railroads" and "crossings" that she was completely tangled, and couldn't repeat correctly one of the systems of directions, to save her, though she had a small memorandum book half filled with hurried notes and names of highways and byways. We set out about half past two in the afternoon, and kept driving along the tortuous roads, mother st-ewing and giving me " pointers,"' and I saymg, " Ves, yes, yes," until we got, finally, to the top of a long hill MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. 167 where we could look right down into the city. "Well, here we are," I exclaimed. " Yes," said mother, "and now I suppose my torment begins." I got out to see what the prospect was, and left mother sitting there in the carriage, clutching the reins. She-had such an expression on her face that 1 couldn't help laughing, although I knew she didn't feel much like it. "Mother, you look as solemn as Joan of Arc going into battle," and I laughed again. " John, now don't you plague me. I've got enough to keep me busy as it is. " " You wait till Kit gets among the mills and she'll make you feel truly heroic," and with this comfort, I started off down the hill. It was even worse than I had supposed. On one side were mills, and an electric car-line ran down the hill most of the way. This was bugaboo number one, as Kit had not been broken to electrics ! (I do not know that it is very sensible to divulge the fact, but were trying to make this whole trip with a horse that had never been broken to them! When we reached Joliet, Illinois, during the first week of our journey, I wanted to spend the time there to thoroughly train Kit upon the subject, but mother was set in the opinion that it would do no good, for she said she would not ride in a street where the cars were running if she could possibly avoid it, and it would only be delaying our progress. So, all along, we kept twisting and turning in order to escape these monsters that I am sure mother was far more afraid of than the horse. But, do the best we could, Kit saw the cars many times at close range, for scores of the small cities and towns were filled with them, so that she got partially used to the peculiar whirr and burr.) As I went down the hill, however, I saw that to get w^///f ;- along, rather than Kit, the first thing to do was to fi"-ure l58 - MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. on dodging the electrics. Coming to the bottom, a sharp turn showed that the road went past a flouring mill and under a low bridge, over which were laid six tracks of the New York Central R. R. This bridge was at the southern edge of Schenectady, and at the entrance of the railway yards. I learned that about twenty freight trains passed oyer this bridge every hour, and that the electric cars went up the hill every twelve minutes. The situation, as a place into which to drive a country-bred horse, reared from a dam that had been of neighborhood note as a kicker, biter, and expert in several other entertaining respects, and was controlled by Your Uncle Consider simply b??cause kindness instead of the whip was employed, struck me as interesting. Climbing back up the hill I told mother she had bet- ter get out of the phaeton. She did so. I jumped in and waited for an electric to go down ahead of us. Mother wanted to know how things were, and I told her, in an off-hand way, "Oh, it's all right. 1 can get through there well enough — " 'J'he car came along and I started before she could quiz me, for I knew that if she were aware of the real state of things she'd have a panic right there. I went sailing, and at the turn saw a freight slowly making for the bridge. I figured I had just time to scoot under before the train got to it. Kit wanted to prance, but I urged her ahead, and, as I was about to pass under, I saw a group of children emerge from the semi-darkness where they had been playing. " Out of that, or I'll go right over you !" and they skedaddled, while I slmt through in triumph about three hundred feet ahead of the big en- gine. I went, perhaps, a quarter of a mile and waited for mother to come up. It seemed an hour before she ar- rived, and then her face was as pale as a sheet. "Oh MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 169 my!" she gasped, "what a place that was! I got to the turn of tlie hill just as that freight was go- ing over, and 1 expected to find things in a heap be- side the road. I haven't been so scared since I've been on this trip. I couldn't see anything of you after you- went around the curve-toward the bridge." "Well, mother, I must say it is the worst trap we have seen yet." That evening, at the hotel, I learned that several persons had been. killed at this bridge owing to their horses becoming frightened while trains were passing overhead. Many of them, too, had belonged to the class of men who say, " I always make my horse go just where I want him to." I remember an instance at Auburn, N. Y, An old farmer drove up with a fiery black colt hitched to a wagon load of butter, eggs and "garden truck." A steam roller was coming down the street, and every- body said, "Better look out for your horse, grandpa." But the old man thought he "could manage thet there critter, sir, 'thout hiding from any ingine thet wuz ever made!" There was a rearing, a sharp twist to the right, a snapping of a thill, then, lightning-like heels sent dash-board, spokes, slivers, golden butter, eggs and tomatoes in all directions. " Grandpa," with about a pound of butter reposing on his bosom, yolk running over his white beard and his coat, found him- self in a heap on the sidewalk, while a few bystanders stood by helpless from laughter. Grandpa scraped his eyes, spit out a mouthful of egg, and screeched : "Hey? Why don't you tarnal fools be tryin' to ketch the devilish beast, stid o' gawpin'!" Back at Oneida Castle, about twenty miles west of Utica, we found that for almost the entire distance between these two places, the West Shore R. R. winds 170 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A as crookedly as the trail of a serpent across the wagon road. Some of the crossings are grade, some are overhead, and, in other places, the wagon-way is under the rail. There have been many fatalities along this course, and we are told that the railway people did this trick in the work of construction purposely, as the farmers in that section seemed to be opposed to grant- ing any favors of land concession to the new company. Hence, wherever the railroad builders could lay the track so it would make things lively for travelers along the highway, they did. The farmers were just as stub- born, and rather than bear the expense of creating a new and safe thoroughfare, they stick to the old one, and keep getting killed off. Yet, in the face of such contingencies, we used to meet people who would say to us, -'Why don't you travel at night? " apparently totally forgetful of the fact that the threshing engines were often run over the roads in the evening, the men being in a hurry to get the machines " set " at the next place to be ready for business early in the morning; and that we were strangers, kno.ving nothing of the country, nothing of the dozens of broken bridges and other frequent obstructions. Several times, we came near getting inextricably lost, and it was broad daylight, too. While going around Toledo and Cleve- land, we got into settlements of foreigners, and we travelled for miles when it seemed as if we could not nd a man who could direct us authoritfitively to any town ten miles away. We had, occasionally, to literally explore our course. Let anybody who thinks of taking a long drive even in the most thickly settled of regions, and who has the idea that each person he meets "can tell the way easy enough," disabuse himself of the error at once, or he will learn it to his sorrow later on. MR EAGLE'S U S. A. 171 We left, with Indiana, the region where they tell you, as in Illinois, " ten miles south, seven straight east and then, one mile south again," or the like, for on the prairies, the land being laid off in sections, the roads run true as a die, and directing a stranger is at once easy and definite. From that time onward, we kept meeting people who would go at it something like this: "Less see, — now — I aint been ter the County Seat for nigh two years. My boy's been, but then, he haint here. Well, — ye keep right on this road till ye git ter where theys three roads come tergether, an' ye take the anglin' road ter ther right, an' keep that till ye git ter Goose Neck Creek, an' then yer turn ter ther lef past an old mill. Co up ther hill, an' go 'bout four miles, till ye come to a cross road, 'n I doan know 's I kin rec'leck no furder. Ye'll hev ter inquire when ye git thar. " This lucid discourse always brought a "How's that?" from us, and then would follow a repetition, equally as valuable as the first attempt. Sometimes, in despera- tion, our acquaintance would pick up a stick and go to scratching away in the sand, trying to make a topo- graphical map. Often, he would make such devious in- terlineations, he would get himself twisted on his own plan. We would terminate the interview by thanking him and drive on, trusting to accidentally popping upon something of consequence from our next victim. It was after following an afternoon of this kind of expe- rience, that I used to find in the hotel some villager who would beam upon me in a fatherly manner, and ask me with the air of a Solon; " Why m the w'orld don't you travel at night? " WAS HIS DECISION JUST? WE stopped, one night, at the home of Al Fetts, in Saratoga county. We were struck with the prosperous appearance of the place. As far as one could see, there was every comfort necessary for the peace and enjoyment of a person of reasonable, rural tastes. Fetts was a handsome man of, I should say, about forty-five, and of unusual education for an agriculturist. He was of a sociable turn, and started into easy, graceful conversation even as he helped nie unharness the horse. I followed him about as he "did the chores," and by the time we walked in to supper we were on quite friendly terms. The family consisted of Fetts's mother, a gray-haired woman of eighty-four, the "hired man," and a Nor- wegian servant girl. I could not help wondering how it happened that Fetts, with his very evident personal attractions and substantial, not to say, rather luxurious surroundings, never married, I having already ascer- tained that he had at no time entered that state of hu- man affairs He seemed to be just the man many a woman in that section certainly might be willing to have for a husband, and she would be mistress of as delightful a country home as could be wished for. I made up my mind, if it was a possible thing in the short time I was to be with him, to get at Fetts's rea- son for remaining a bachelor. MR. KAGLE'S U. S. A. 173 Late in the evening, the servant busying herself in the pantry, the hired man ofi for a village dance, and the aged mother abed long ago, Fetts and I found our- selves snuggled down by the kitchen stove for a little chat and smoke. Mother had also retired, well aweary from the day's ride. As we concluded gossip about crops and politics, I endeavored, as adroitly as I could, to swing Fetts around to more sentimental topics. He sparred good naturedly at first, but finally related some interesting little experiences, while I responded with a few of my own. (Meagre and maudlin they were, too.) We gradually grew into a somewhat confidential atti- tude, and, before retiring, at a midnight hour, I believe that Al Fetts revealed to me his star chapter in affairs of the heart. I shall give it, as nearly as I am able, in his own words and way": "I was one of — let me get this pipe to going — the most bashful boys, I believe, that mortal ever saw. Up to the time I was nineteen, I had never been to a party; not because I had not been invited, but because I could not go into a room where there were girls. However, the evening of my nineteenth birthday marked my ' coming out.' Fred Jones, my chum, drove over about dark, and wanted me to go to a neighbor's with him. I got into the buggy and, in a short time, we reached the house. I thought something was wrong for I noticed that the rooms were all lighted up, but Jones was at the door and had knocked before I could take a second thought. The next minute, I was facing a crowd of girls. ' Good evening, Mr. Jones! ' and 'Oh Mr. Fetts! Is it you? Why, we're so glad you have come!' they were all exclaiming together In they dragged me. I got over by the stove and sat down to warm myself. 174 MR. RAGLE'S USA. The throng presently left for the parlor, after having declared they would be out after me soon. " ' Well, what shall I do? ' I said to myself in agony. ' I never can go in there and face all that crew! ' I was in a most miserable fix. I didn't have long to cog- itate, however, for they kept their word and were out with, 'Oh Mr. Fetts! We're sure you must be warm enough now!' My face I well knew was crimson as a rooster's comb, and 1 could feel the perspiration start- ing, but I stammered out, 'Oh no, I am not. I am not warm yet.' Well, those girls just whopped in the wood and left me to my fate, saying they should not wait so long this time. The stove was getting up to a bright red and the drops were trickling off my fore- head. "Just then, I thought of a scheme. I hurried out on my tip-toes to the entry and sought my cap and coat, but I could not find them anywhere. I realized that that inhuman Jones had hidden them. I heard the army coming again, and skedaddled back to the stove. I had just got my feet on the fender when they were upon me. ' Well, we know you are warm now! 'and, giggling and laughing as if they could hardly contain themselves, the girls did not give me a chance to utter my former ridiculous wail. They caught hold of me, and were going to take me into the parlor whether or no. I saw something had to be done, and summoning what dignity I could command, I said, ' I don't propose to be hauled in there like an ox to the slaughter. Now, if one of you young ladies will take my arm, I'll go along.' 'Why certainly, Mr. Fetts! ' said Augusta Furman, suiting action to word, and slip- ping her arm through mine. The others fell back, and in we went. I got along first rate. I was introduced MR KAGI.E'S U S A. 175 and my timidity gradually wore off. I came away having had a most delightful evening. "It was not long until I thought it very agreeable to go calling, as well as the rest of the fellows, on a young lady, of a Sunday evening. The one 1 went to see was Augusta Furman. I had had a sort of friendly feeling for her because of her kindly act on the occasion of the party. It was enhanced by my visits at her home. She was about twenty-four and handsome — absolutely the handsomest girl I have ever seen. She had been graduated at a seminary, and had visited a great deal in the large cities. She was cele- brated as a flirt, though, and had a long and variega- ted list of rejected suitors. " I had been visiting Augusta about two years, when one day I was over in Mechanicsville. As I was driv- ing by, George Beelman called out from his office door and asked me to come in. Beelman was a bright law- yer and prominent in that county, but he had been discarded by Miss Furman just the same. With few preliminaries, he proceeded to talk about that lady. He was so civil in the way he approached the subject that I was not in the least offended. He warned me above everything to 'look out for her.' He declared she would so manage a man that she would make him love her, and that her principal aim in life was to control men. He referred to the others, among them poor Will Way, but declared that for himself, he meant to live on and come up in his profession. At the end of an hour's most earnest conversation, his last word to me was, ' Look out Al ! Look out ! ' "I was disposed to think, as I rode home, that so far as I was concerned, there was little need for Beel- man's cautions. I immensely enjoyed Augusta's soci- 1^6 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. ety, for she was so exceedingly entertaining, such a bright conversationaHst, that time seemed to just fly when I was with her. 'But how,' I reasoned, 'can that woman think me worth exercising any of her arts upon, me, a common farmer, when she has so many smart professional and business men from the different towns among her acquaintaces? ' Then, as I studied the situation, 1 began to recall certain little sayings and acts that, to say the least, were peculiar. I reached the conclusion it might be wise, after all, to not wholly disregard Beelman's advice. "Well, — to keep my story in limit, — the time did come when, surely enough, I was forced to the con- clusion that Augusta Furman was planning to manoever me just as she had the others. Then I stopped going to see her. "Later I met her several times, at the post office, at church, and on the street. She seemed ex- tremely desirous of knowing why I had ceased calling upon her, and would insist that I come to her house and tell her what the trouble was. 1 would excuse myself as best I could, but one day she saw me and urged so strongly that I could not avoid bringing mat- ters to a decision. I looked her directly in the eye and said, 'Augusta, do you mean to say you really want me to tell you?' She met my gaze equally as firmly. ' Yes, I do, and you must. I shall not be content un- til you do.' 'Augusta,' I replied, ' it will be a painful affair for both of us.' " I had my story carefully thought out. For this reason, when I entered her home that Sundayevening, I was cool and composed. "We sat down on the lounge and I began, 'Augusta, you have insisted that I let you know why I stopped MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 177 coming here. I have only concluded to tell you under the belief that what 1 am going to say may be the best for you ; that possibly it may be my duty to say it.' She looked around at me with surprise in her eyes, and seemed to be wondering what in the world I was get- ting at. "'Augusta, you showed me, an awkward, country youth, a kindness at that party which appealed to me strongly. Then, when I came to your home, you made the evenings delightful. It was a feast to me. You were handsome. You were polished. You had seen something of the great, gay, fashionable life outside this narrow, obscure, rural neighborhood. 1 was brought in touch with an experience far different from any I had ever before known. I liked to come here as a matter of enjoyment. It was the most complete pleasure to me to hear your entertaining talk. The wonderful daintiness of the room was a charm, the artistic arrangement of the flowers, the pictures upon the walls, your playing so skilfully on the piano. All those things conspired to make my evenings here en- trancing. I was young and unsophisticated. You had many bright, educated men here who were constantly attending you. The situation tended to greatly delay my becoming aware of your exercising any of your arts upon me. I — ' "'Why, what do you mean!' exclaimed Augusta, while her eyes fairly blazed. ' How dare you talk like that? You are insulting! ' "'Now Augusta, it's no use,' I said calmly. 'I OQme here to say my say, and 1 shall do so ' " 'As I became better and better acquainted with you,' I went on, 'I did have perception enough to realize that you did and said things that were a little sur- 178 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. prising. As time went along, those happenings grew more pronounced. You would use certain long and technical expressions, the meaning of which I did not get because the words were such as I had never heard. I followed the practice, after I had lift your house, of putting those sentences down in a note book, and, in my room, I would look them up in the dictionary. I found, in each case, that the utterances pointed more or less plainly toward an interesting subject — love. I steadily observed that ihey were being used more fre- quently by you, as well as that several other arts were more regularly employed, suggesting your especial in- terest in me. ' " ' Al Fetts, you shall not accuse me of such things! I'll not stand it! I'll have you put out of the house!' " She well knew to what I referred. Again I assured her it were folly to get angry, calmed her down, and started ahead by hauling out my trusty memorandum. Turning to a certain page, I asked, 'Augusta, did you not, on such and such an evening, make this assertion?' And I read it off. " Her cheeks flushed, and her head lowered. She refused to answer. " ' Did you not say it? ' I urged. " I — I do not remember,' she answered. " Do you dare deny uttering it? ' "There was no reply. I worked carefully through the entire list of selections. Then putting the book back in my pocket, I said: " ' Augusta, think of Will Way. ^Vhat was he when he began to call on you? One of the finest young men in the township. Good looking, intelligent, of excel- lent family and habits, he was a glorious specimen of manhood. No youth had better prospects. People MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 179 expected great things of Will. What did he become after you rejected him? What is he now? A drunken, hope- less sot reeling toward his grave. Is it nothing to you that his mother says you led him on just to destroy him? Is it nothing to you that folks, as they see Will's bleared eyes and his shaking shoulders, whisper sadly with one another and mention your name? ' " I must say there was a pretty solemn look came over Augusta's face and, finally, I fancied there was something like a mist in her eye. "'Was there,' I resumed, 'ever a more promising minister placed over this church than Henry ^Villiams? He became infatuated with you. You rejected him. Do you ever think of the saddened face that man wore when he left this town to become a wandering evan- gelist? Do you pretend to claim you were wholly free from connection with his leaving? " 'And George Wray, too. He loved you, and you well know it. You carefully and patiently drew him out, but to hand down the same verdict the others re- ceived. His bones lie out in one of those Arizona canyons where the Apaches shot him.' " The bravado, the temper, and the hauteur had slowly vanished. Augusta was crying. I was not sure, however, that her mood was sincere. I went on and mentioned some others who had suffered by their ex- perience with her. Presently, I said: "'Augusta, to my mind, the woman who, through her natural beauty and her skill in such matters, delib- erately wins the love of an h(jnest man for the sole purpose of enjoying the gratification of refusing his proposal of marriage, does as cruel a thing as woman is capable of.' " ' Oh Al, don't say that!' Augusta exclaimed, as l8o MR EAGLE'S U. S. A. she looked up with the tears streamin,^ down her face. ' Don't say that. I never thought of it that way. Oh, if somebody had only said this to me before, when it was not too late ! ' " 'As truly as there is such a thing as retributive jus- tice,' I continued, 'just so certain is it that you will pay for what you have done. You will live to see the day that you will suffer for these things. Augusta, there was a time when I believed you perfection, but that day has passed. It passed when I began to know your true charater. After tonight, I shall never set foot in this house.' "She looked at me with a startled expression in her eyes, and, seizing my hand, begged me over and over not to say that I meant that, pleaded and pleaded for me to tell her I had the feelings of old toward her, but I assured her that it was impossible 1 tried to go, but she clung to me, hysterically imploring that I re- tract what I had said and declare I still loved her. "I, at last, got to my feet, and moved toward the door. That act seemed to set Augusta in a frenzy. She sprang toward me and throwing her arms about my neck, said over and over, 'Al, I love you! I love you! Don't go, Al ! For God's sake, don't go! ' "I took hold of her wrists firmly but gently, and, looking down into her face, asked, 'Augusta, is that the first time you have said that? ' " 'As Heaven is my witness it is !,' " ' Have you not said it by acts, if not in words? ' " Her head hung. 'N-no, I am not sure I can say no to that.' "Well, — it was two o'clock before I left her, and when I did, she was so limp that I had to carry her over to the lounge and lay her upon it. MR. EAGLES U. S. A. jgi * * " Six months later, I was working in northwestern Iowa, as a life insurance agent. I was there about two years when I was called home b)^ the illness of my father. One of the first things I heard was that, some four fnonths since, Augusta Furman had been married to a stylish young man, supposed to be a New York physician. They had gone up to Saratoga Springs to spend the honeymoon. The first week of their stay, the husband had been arrested. He proved to be a noted horse thief, and was now in Auburn prison. " My father shortly getting better, I went back to Iowa. Four years later, he died, and I returned again to take care of mother and the farm. That Fall, I was down at the County Fair, one afternoon, with my brother-in-law, and going through the Horticultural building, when I heard some one in the crowd call, 'Al ! Al! ' I turned, but could see no one wanting me, and started on, thinking it was some other 'Al ' that was meant. Then, I heard it again, 'Al! Al ! Al Fetts?' Once more, I faced about, and looked searchingly. Away back in the throng, I saw a woman heavily veiled waving a glove. As I retraced my steps, she came toward me, and said, 'Al, how do you do?' 'Pretty well,' I answered, 'but you have the advantage of me. I don't recollect ever having met you before.' She came nearer and raised her veil, saying, 'Al, don't you remember Augusta? ' " I involuntarily stepped back a little and exclaimed, 'My God! Is this Augusta Furman?' She nodded her head, while tears came to her eyes. I never saw such a change in a human being. The splendid red cheeks were pale and sunken, the beautiful blue eyes dulled, the luscious lips thin and colorless. l82 MR EAGLE'S U S. A. "As I glanced at her shabby black dress, I took both her hands in mine, and looking- into her face, asked, " 'Well, Augusta, how has it been with you? ' " Her voice was scarcely audible as she faltered, "'Oh Al, you told me too trnllifnllyl' " From that day to this, I liave never seen nor heard oi lier. " A' OLD TAVERNS AND MODERN DRUNKENNESS. FTER we got into Western New York, and from there onward, we began to strike the old tavern, the decaying, tattered remnant of other days. From Albany to Buffalo, along the Albany and Gen- essee pikes, were the great avenues through which poured the armies of emigrants that, between 1820 and 1840, were plodding, by means of ox and mule teams, out to the prairies of Indiana and Illinois. All along this stretch of 230 miles there were public houses situ- ated at intervals of from five to six miles. Great, roomy structures, most of them, in which from one to two hundred people would be lodged every ni^ht. These highways were busy scenes then. All freight carriage was done by means of the great " Conestoga wagons, and the only way to transport cattle was to drive them over the dusty roads. At night, the large yards near the tavern would be filled with a bleating, bawling assortment of creatures tired by the travel and excited by the new surroundings. The door-yard and perhaps each side of the door-way, for rods, would be thronged with freight wagons, loaded with barrels of flour, boxes, and farming tools, or there would be long, canvas covered carts, almost the only earthly possessions of those who were going out to settle the virgin West. The women and children were stowed away up stairs, and below until nine o'clock, for i84 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. lights went out early in those days, there was noisy confusion. The big, ruddy boniface would be behind the bar, dealing out straight and good whiskey to the adventurous fellows about him. I say "straight and ai)t)d whiskey," and it was. None of your "kill at forty rods," but the "pure quill." That was what these landlords sold in those days, and if anybody got too much of it, they simply threw him down and sat upon his neck, that he might come to a realizing sense of his responsibilities as a citi^cen. Those were glorious times. "Why," said an old fellow to me, "I used to take in $140 a day over this bar." The laying of the New York Central railroad took off passenger, and a great deal of freight traflic, but still travel over the pike was of fair proportion, as the railroad did not carry cattle, and, for some years, considerable freight- ing was done. In the '40's the railway, which b;.cl agreed that if the State Assembly would permit it to carry cattle, passengers in turn sliould be transported at the rate of two cents a mile, got the privilege. That was the death blow to the old tavern How changed the scenes in this region today! Near West Junius, in Seneca county, stands a two-story building, with double veranda supported by stately white col- umns, once the finest hotel in that section. For years it has remained unoccupied except by the troop of bats and owls that fly in and out of the broken windows, and the loosened clapboards Hap dismally on a windy day as a reminder of adversity. This was the Henry VanDemark tavern, built in 1828, and it made a fortune for the owners. Even now, if the old structure were repaired, and in a summer resort, it might be made a very respectable boarding-house. At Mycene, a little southwest of Canastota, is the Mabee House, MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. igj built by one 'Lish Mabee, in 1799. At Clifton Park village, in Saratoga County, is a tavern that has been used as a public house for over one hundred and fifty years. These were but types of dozens that we saw. As we came to a great, gray building, one noon, we stopped, and mother, to better study the affair, got down from the carriage. We had no thought of any- body being there, but suddenly a white head was thrust out of a window, and a venerable dame asked, " Do you want anything? " This opened the way for a few minutes' conversation, in which we learned that she had been living there for several years, in a couple of rooms on the first floor, undisturbed by the ghostly and cobwebby apartments about her. Husband dead, children scattered to the four winds, this eighty-year- old being was eking out a forsaken living by making rugs. "Don't you want to buy one?" she implored. Sometimes we would come to a neat, nicely kept moderri farm-house, and off to one side would be an old, ramshackle af^ir used as a granary, or chicken house. This was the old "tavern," and where the occupant of the new house made his money. A few of these structures that played so important a part in the enterprise of fifty years ago are still used as hotels, but the way they are managed is a spectacle for the gods. I have seen Poles intoxicated at a Chicago picnic, and Italian miners on a rampage at Central Illinois coal mines, but for deadened, habitual besotted drink- ers I never saw any to surpass those in the little towns along through New York State. It was not an occasional experience of seeing a few bibulous fellows engage in a neighborly row on the street and officers presently taking the whole party to the lock- l86 MR. EAGLE'S U. S.- A up. No, we came into town after town where we would drive up to the tavern and wait vainly for some one to come out, and, at last, we would have to go in and hunt up the keeper in much the same pains-taking way that the earnest parent has to when he wants John Henry to turn the grindstone. VVhen we found the chief, he was often so stupefied with the persistent tak- ing of " Here's to ye ! " that he did not know if he were on the earth or off. And the prices I I remem- ber one of the first landlords we struck, after getting into the State. "What are your rates?" I asked. "Two dollars a day!" 1 just looked at him; I could not say a word. I glanced at the dirty, dingy walls, and thought of the day, last year, which I spent at a eighty-thousand-dollar hotel in Sioux City, away out in the northwestern corner of Iowa. I thought of the course-dinner and the troops of colored waiters, and that for that day's board I was asked two dollars. I thought of Sheldon, Iowa, a town of not over two thousand inhabitants, yet possessing a twenty-thousand- dollar hotel, at a two dollar rate. "Friend," I said when I got my tongue, "are you sure you haven't the price too low?" "Well," he answered, somewhat shamefacedly, "I tell ye, we git so few travelers we have to ask more." "So it's 'catch 'em and skin 'em,' " I concluded. (I am free to say that I often did go to bed in a room so musty that I wondered if mother and I were not the only guests who had been in the house since the war.) We found, as we went along, that it was quite the thing, in many of the towns or hamlets, for women to patronize the drinking rooms, as well as the men. In Leroy, a town large and thrifty, in one of the principal hotels, I saw girls who could not have been more than MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 187 fourteen or sixteen, being conducted into the place and up to the parlor. Their escorts would then hurry to the bar and bring in the beer. I think about ten or twelve girls were ushered into that room, at various times, during the evening. Yet, I suppose that if a tout had ct)me to Leroy and set up a dance house, he'd have been arrested before he had been running two days, and there would have been tongue-wagging among the gossips for six months. In Batavia, Genessee county, we walked the streets for three-quarters of an hour, trying to find a restaur- ant, hotel, or lunch-room without a bar attachment, and at last had to give it up, as we found that what a man had said at the start was the fact: "There wan't no place but what they sold drinks." Stopping in front of a saloon, we went up stairs where we were told the dining room was. Before mother could get into the "parlor" to wait for the preparation of our meals, the barkeeper had to come up and eject a lout who had been there since morning sleeping off a drunk The institution resembled in most respects, so far as I could see, one of the "transient" establishments of the large cities. A little jerkwater railroad runs from Clinton up to Rome, and while we were at Clinton I had occasion to proceed to Rome over this magnificent line. As I entered the coach I heard such a commotion as would have rivalled the celebration of a foot-ball match. The train was packed with a gang of hop-pickers, some three hundred of them, men, women and children. Thty had just been paid off, and had come up from points ten to twenty miles below Clinton, bound to Rome and Utica for a good time. Nearly all the men were drunk, drunk as they could be and manage to l88 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. keep their feet, in fact, many had already passed that stage, and, jammed down between car seats, were do- ing no harm. Pandemonium reigned. Leering lub- bers reeled and jostled and shouted at the top of their voices all the vile words they could think of. Mere boys tumbled along the aisle. Some of the females were crying and tugging at the coats of husbands or brothers, begging them to be quiet. Nasty talk was their reward. Scattered through the different coaches were a number of refined, handsome young ladies, who had got aboard at various stations, not knowing they were on the "hop train" until it was too late. Their confusion was painful in the extreme. I saw one of those hulking brutes lean over and attempt to kiss a pretty girl in a gray suit. She screamed and slapped his face. These men, most of them, had been at work from one to three weeks at a sort of labor which, according to the rate of pay, and the manner in which they had probably worked, had brought them between eight to ten dollars! It was safe to say that not a man had more than twelve dollars in his pocket, and the majority no more than six, yet here they were, tanked like a winning prize fighter within three hours after getting their money. The scene, aside from its disgusting features, was pathetic, for nearly all these people showed plainly by face and clothes that they belonged to the class that would be in desperately hard lines ere the winter was out, even if they were to save every penny they could earn. At a hotel in Valley Falls, just after we had crossed the Hudson, the man who stabled our horse was so drunk that he had great difficulty in getting out of the barn. As I saw him, lantern in hand, coming along behind the string of horses, wobbling and staggering ^^ #>lk MB/ ^ . /^-^ ^IP ^^ ' "' ^B 9lkl'^^^^^ '^^ttf' ? 11 IK RUG MARI'.R. MR EAGLE'S U, S. A. 189 in his effort to get ahead, I expected every instant to see a hoof get loose, and man, lantern and pipe go through the side of the barn And so it was, to an extent I have not space to de- lineate. A shiftless, thriftless landlord, with a crew of dazed, dumb soaks about him,. and himself unfit to do a thing other than hand out cheap liquor. Women's Christian Unioners! do not tear around so about reforming the alkali plains of Oklahoma or South- western New Mexico. Get right out into the small towns and hamlets of the highly civilized Empire State. There's work enough for you all right there. A CHANGE OF BASE. BUT when you go from Hoosac to North Adams most of the way, eighteen miles, you'll be driving so close to the Fitchburg that you can lay your whip on the rails! " Depend upon it, this an- nouncement was received with interest. We got it of a postman we met as we were driving out of Hoosick Falls, on our way to North Hoosick, simply Hoosick, as many call it. Our route since we crossed the Hud- son, at Mechanicsville, had been along the roughest and most dangerous roads we had yet seen. They wound around among the railroads so that the only way to make the crossings safely was for me to go ahead as a sort of scout. I began to think I was elected to walk the rest of the trip. We stopped over night at Hoosick, and in the morning mother took a train and went down to North Adams, Mass., to get the mail which we had ordered forwarded there, but, perhaps, niainlv to see what the outlook was for going into the Hub by way of the Berkshires. WMien she got back, about eleven o'clock, her tale was of woe "Why, the road is much worse even than the folks have told us!" she exclaimed, "Over long distances it runs right in between the two tracks; part of the way, I'd look out, and at first couldn't see the wagon road, — then I'd find it was within a yard of the train And Hoosac Mountain! It looks as if the road over it was going MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 191 right up into the air!" "Well," I mused, "I certainly don't propose to straddle the Fitchburg, nor any other railroad, into Boston I'll drive by way of Canada first." Therefore, on the afternoon of September 22, we found ourselves plodding northward to Bennington. On our right, lay Pownal mountain, cold, cloud-covered and forbidding, as, indeed, seemed all the scenery. For mountain rapture, one does not want to be too close. It is distance that creates the " alluring " business. We soon saw the tall pile of granite known as the Bennington Battle Monument. It was a great day for Bennington when this monument was -dedicated in August, 1891. President Harrison, Edward J. Phelps, Wheelock Veazey, W. E. Russell, General O. O. How- ard, R. A. Alger, Redfield Proctor, a horde of military and civic notables, together with 40,000 ordinary mor- tals were present. The quiet townsfolk are yet talk- ing of that event. Ever since John Stark met the British, Bennington has regularly celebrated the occur- rence. As early as 1877, the project of building the monument was hinted. By 1887, a committee was at work, yet it had hardly set about its labors ere the ar- gument over the proper site began. Scribblers of all degrees of ignorance and culture saw their opportunity, and the columns of the Troy limes and Bennington Banner were filled with tremendous rigmaroles, for when you get east of the Alleghenies, a proposition to build a town hall has to first go through the fire of ex- tended literary criticism. It was contended that the " battle of Bennington " should be called the "battle of Waloomsac" by rights, as the contest was not fought in Vermont at all, but across the line, in New York, and near the town of Waloomsac. The struggle was 192 MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. now contested again throughout and with a great deal more science than brave Stark displayed, for these writer chaps worked with pencils and could set the British down an}' place, and mow oft" the redcoats by lines, or brigades, just as would sound best. The monument was finally built in Waloomsac, on the hill overlooking the town of Bennington, and still the shaft is not located where the battle was fought^ as the actual struggle took place seven miles away, in the valley, the stores which the Hessians desired to capture being on this hill. The affair cost $80,000, of which amount Congress contributed half, the rest being made up by Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. The shaft is above the height of Bunker Hill.'s, and the po- sition is a superb one in a scenic respect, the spectator being able to sweep the valley for miles, while the mountains across seem an impassable barrier against the outside world. During our evening at the village of Bennington I had occasion to go to the home of a machinist. The man was not in when I arrived, and while 1 was wait- ing for him his wife, an intelligent looking woman, but gifted with the genuine Yankee curiosity, asked me where I was from. I told her, " Illinois." Then she was full of questions. "I suppose it's a rich country out there," she said. I told her about the place in Dakota where it is claimed " if you planted pumpkin seeds the vines would grow so fast you couldn't catch the pumpkins. "The poor wo- man had so expected she was going to hear something "big" that I think it must have been three minutes before she so much as smiled. "But when you get out of Chicago, it's mostly little bits of towns, isn't it?" she went on. "Just a few houses or hamlets?" When I declared that there were many towns of BENNINGTON BATTLE MONUMENT. MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. 193 twelve to twenty thousand, and that they had their electric light plants, street railways, high schools and libraries, I know by the look she gave me that she felt I was the most habitual liar she had seen for years. She maintained a furious question bombardment, and, finally,' I thought I'd put her some. "What would you think," I asked, "if you should see a lot of cribs built in the form of a square with one side of the square open, and when it was desired to feed the cattle a farm hand simply lifted up the lower boards along the cribs, and the cattle rushed up and ate what they wanted, while they trampled more in the mud? Or what would you think if you saw a couple of boys, at ' corn shucking ' time, jump on the wagons and race across an eighty- acre field while ten or twelve bushels of corn were jostled out into the mud?" "I should think it crimi- nal wastefulness," she said with decision. "What would you do if you were driving along, and you sud- denly saw that the road was black with hogs, two or three hundred of them?" "Well, I should get out and climb the fence!" "But suppose the fence was barbed wire?" "Well, I should be getting some- where." "Or, if you should see a man plowing with a steam engine?" "A steam engine?" she exclaimed. "Yes, a steam engine, and drawing twelve or si.xteen plows, these being all fastened to an iron beam so that every time they crossed the field twelve to sixteen fur- rows were turned?" "Oh Lord!" she said. The next morning we set out to make our way across Southern Vermont, heading for Wilmington, twenty- two miles distant. We spent the forenoon climbing a spur of the Hoosac range, ascending gradually until at noon we were in the Woodstock House, 3,000 feet above sea level. All one could see were woods, -woods, 194 MR. EAGLE'S lA S. A. woods, and distant, sloping, awful ranges of woods. Things iiad a horribly threatening aspect to me. It seemed as if we had got thousands of miles above the earth, of real, every-day life. Mountains lay to the right of us; to the left; beneath; no matter which way we looked. Not a sound was to be heard. The lonesomeness of existence upon a sheep ranch upon the far western plains is appalling, but it struck me that life among these mountains would not afford much better choice. And the people who live here! You know, in those stories by New England novelists the dwellers in the Vermont and New Hampshire hills are always dear, sweet-faced old ladies, who sit in their morning-glory covered porches while troops of dainty, city children come to prattle about, and eat ginger- bread as the saintly grandmas tell of the beautiful days of the past. What /saw were a lot of poverty-stricken, faded, angular beings who seemed as benighted to the general world as if they had been born and kept in dungeons. And they had — the dungj'ons of fighting for bread on these God-forsaken rocks, and of shiver- ing out the winter in mountain cabins. We passed a weather-beaten house. VVindow panes broken and the openings filled with rags and shingles, barn tumbling to pieces, and, in the pasture, stood the lord of this domain surveying a couple of aged cows whose ribs showed through their brindled sides. He^ wore a pair of threadbare, blue overalls and an old straw hat. There he stood vacantly chewing a spear of Timothy (a rare article he'd somewhere discovered) and looking as disconsolate a creature as ever I saw. In front of another cabin, a woman of, I should think, thirty-five, her frowsy, yellow hair flying in the breeze and wearing an old "Jersey," was bending over a MR. EAGLE'S U, S. A. 195 wheelbarrow assorting some apples, while she sucked contentedly away at her clay pipe. Mother relished the spectacle and exclaimed, enthusiastically, "There's your chance, John! There's just the woman you ought to have, for there'd be no quarreling. You could both sit down behind the stove and smoke together!" Yes, stacks of books dilating on the peace- ful sublimity of life in the New England backwoods have, for years, dropped from the presses, and the dropping ceaseth not. But the cold truth of the dreadful, puritanical, superstitious existence remains a fresh area for some Dickens. The life that Lizzie Borden led, despite the wealth of her parents, as ex- l)Osed at the Fall River trial, was almost as great a revelation to the city people of New England as it was to the rest of the country. The pmched, pale faces of the school teachers in these mountain towns tell truer than could words, the starvation and privation of soul that they patiently endure until they go to the side- hill graveyard among the blackberry bushes. We spent the afternoon plodding up and down along this mountain ridge for seven miles, having a most perplexing time in keeping the road. The highway was no different in appearance from those leading to saw-mills and timber lots. We asked a man we met coming up, the \\ ay down (we were at the fork of two roads) '• I51essed 'f I can tell you," he said, "I'm a stranger, too. When I left Wilmington I asked a fel- h'W about the road, and he said 'I'd find it a little rol- lin' and I should think, by jingoes, it was!" After a while, however, we found ourselves going d-nvn, and we kept at it, until, toward night, we were at Wil- mington, ready for the morrow's climb over the Hog- back mountain to Brattleboro. FARMING: EAST AND WEST. ATAHAT we become used to our surroundings, I is a merciful law of nature. Whatever they may be, we learn to like them, and to feel such a sense of content that we are loath to break away from them, even though our judgment is convinced that we could greatly improve our condition by so doing. This has been demonstrated so often in everyday life that it has come to be an accepted fact by the most ignorant We pity the poor always, but we regard with special sympathy the persons who have been suddenly hurled from affluence to a state of indigence. "Poor souls!" we, who are used to poverty, say, "they don't know how to battle with want. They don't know how to make, and mend, and turn the many-pieced garment of Poverty. They do not know how to extract the life-supporting juices of the beef bone, or to handle to best account the bit of vegetable or penny's worth of stale bread," and we sum up the situation with, " It won't be so bad when they get used to it." The convict becomes so used to his cell and prison life that, after confinement for several years, he seldom accepts pardon with a feeling of gladness. It is the existence of this same natural law, in the main, that causes people to continue to huddle together in wretch- edness in cities, where they have to dig and scratch to keep body and soul together, instead of getting out MR EAGLE'S O. S. A. 197 into the pure air of the open country, and cultivating the rich acres that invite labor with all the seductive- ness that sunshine, health and plenty can offer. Why not go where, with the finest climate, the most productive soil on the face of the globe can be pur- chased for from $18 to $20 per acre, or rented for $2 an acre per year? This you will find in the State of Iowa. (I propose to set forth my own personal experience and go only into such details as I know to be actual facts, from such experience, aa I well realize that gen- eralities too often have little weight with the very classes it is desired to reach. A statement of this nature is much like that required in a law case. It is not what one thinks, or guesses, but what he knows, and what references he can advance, that gives his evi- dence weight before the jury. Herein, I know that I am assuming to talk before the jury — the jury of poor, discouraged tillers of the soil, who would try to better their condition if they could once be assured of there being an actual opportunity so to do. For this reason and as an earnest of good faith, I have not hesitated to use specific names and dates, and the doubter can readily satisfy himself if I state the reality by the sim- ple employment of pen and paper. I represent no corporation. I would just as soon say, •' Move to the Dry Tortugas," were I to have had the experience of as satisfactory conditions as I know the State of Iowa to possess. What I delineate here is that which has been indelibly graven upon my mind after practical, protracted study of the agricultural status of the Dakotas, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, and that of every State from Ohio eastward). How often, as we heard your complaints, you of the igg MR. EAGLE'S U. S. A. worn-out farms of Ohio, New York, Vermont and New Hampshire, you who are struggHng along in the effort to pick a mere pittance off the rocks and the worth- less sand-soil, you whose twisting and turning to make every cent count was so pitifully evident, did we think of those Iowa leagues that have slejH for ages awaiting but the dropping of the seed to belch forth corn and oats and prosperity! Iowa has as dry, healthful,- invigorating a climate as Vermont and New Hampshire It is no colder, and I do not think as cold in winter. Iowa has never had the malarious climate of Illinois which the early set- tlers in that State had to battle against, but which cul- tivation of the soil has now almost wholly banished. I do not know how to say enough in praise of the clear, crisp, bracing atmosphere of Iowa, I have left my home in Ottawa, LaSalle county, Illinois, at six o'clock p. m., tired, worried, worn with previous days of hard work and anxiety, and, after a night on the train, arrived at Livermore, Kossuth county, Iowa, at five o'clock a. m., actually experiencing a briskness and freshness such as I had never known in days of health and restfulness in Illinois. The first time I took this trip I thought such a sense of exhilaration must be imagination, but, after repeating the trip a dozen times or more, I could not doubt it was due to the bracing qualities of the climate. 1 could accom- plish more mental labor during my stay ther^-, which was usually from two to three weeks, than at any other period of my life, and the strain of business effort and anxiety was never followed by unpleas mt reaction. I would return to Illinois improved in condition in every way. I have been there at all seasons, and have no exceptions to make to any portion of the year. I have MR. KAGLE'S U S. A. 199 ridden over the country with pony team as far as sixty miles a day, many miles of that being over unbroken prairie sod. The black loam of Iowa is like that of the corn belt of Illinois, about two-and-a-half or two feet deep, and over-lies a yellowish clay. I cannot say that it never wears out, or diminishes in fertility, but the likeHhood of it so doing may be well paralleled by the story of the man who lived in a house having a stone wall and a stone roof, but who had the entire structure covered with Ixjards in order that the rock might not be affect- ed by action of the weather! Iinva is a newer settled country than Illinois, and has not had time to be so thoroughly tested as that State, but it is a fact that the famous corn belt of Illi- nois grows as fine crops to-day as it did thirty years ago. They have made their owners rich, and the ma- jority of them have large farms. There is no reason why Iowa will not do the same. There is no reason why the land in Iowa which can be purchased now for $18 to $25 per acre should not, within a few years, have a market value as great as the same grade of land in Illinois, which is now $ioo per acre. Speculators in land have amassed large fortunes in Iowa, as they have so frequently in Illinois. I am personally acquainted with a banker in Ottawa who purchased land of the Milwaukee & St. Paul R. R. Co. in Iowa a few years ago, so cheaply that when he sold it, some six years since at $io per acre, his net profit was $100,000! The same land cannot be bought to- day for less than $20 to $25 per acre. I know another resident of Ottawa who went to South I.)akota in August, 1895, ^^^^^ purchased 1000 acres of raw land for $7,000, and within three months 200 MK. EAGLE'S U. S. A. was offered an advance in cash of $3,000. In Novem- ber of the same year I bought 160 acres situated in Kossuth county, Iowa, of a German who could neither read nor write (his wife could, though), and paid him $25 an acre. Three years previously this same piece cost the seller but $10 per acre. In the Fall of 1892 I selected 600 acres lying along the Minneapolis &: St Louis R R., that I could j^urchase at an average rate of $18 per acre. In December, 1895, I could not touch an acre in all this vicinity for less than $30. I purchased, however, at this time, 120 acres and paid $32 per acre. Six months later I was offered $40 per acre for the same piece. In 1893 I bought a quarter section (160 acres) for $3,000. I did not make a wise choice. I was aware of this right after I made the contract. There were other pieces just as good which I could have taken for $2,500. But the parcel I bought netted me an average yearly profit of five per cent, during the three years I owned it, and in April, 1896, I sold it for $4,500. We own forty acres in "Starving Kansas (Nemaha county) that have netted us eight per cent, income during the last four years. It is only partially under cultivation, has no fe\. / .*i:^'* -^ A- o V = ^^-^^^ V 1^ . 1 • 'bV^ •>o^ O'-^f^'o** \.-'?.^\<^^ ^V^^\o*^ \.- '. '-f^o^^ 'i^„:- ^-„.*^ -^^Si'- "'-^^.<'' ■*- ■. P» KMAN W INC. AUG 88 'oK